


Definition Unknown

by WSSHolmes



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Asexual Sherlock, Pining Sherlock, Questioning Sexuality, Sexuality, Sherlock Series 3 Spoilers, romantic orientations
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-16
Updated: 2016-01-15
Packaged: 2018-02-17 15:18:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 29
Words: 44,986
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2314181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WSSHolmes/pseuds/WSSHolmes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'The dimple on John’s cheek only occurred during 73% of his smiles.<br/>Sherlock wondered when and why his brain had decided to calculate such a figure.'<br/>*<br/>Sherlock has had two years to think about his relationship with John. When he returns to London after taking down Moriarty's web Sherlock is shocked and hurt to find John has moved on and is now living with Mary. <br/>Sherlock struggles to define the relationship he wants with John when friendship no longer feels like an adequate definition. With John and Mary's upcoming marriage, could it be too late, even if he does figure it out? <br/>*<br/>This is a Series 3 AU though the first chapter is set in between Series one and two.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Before

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everyone.   
> This is a WIP, with the first few chapters already written. I wasn't planing to post until the story was completed but I think it will encourage me to write more often if I have some kind of deadline. I'm going to try and update once a week on either Tuesday or Wednesday, depending on my work roster.  
> Hope you enjoy!

It was a Wednesday when Sherlock first recognised a change in his own behaviour. Molly had been kind enough to gift him with some new tissue samples and he had just finished boxing and labelling them before storing them on the bottom shelf of the fridge. Sherlock’s memory was perfect, he never forgot what was in each bag, and he also didn't care where in the fridge he shoved them. The labels were for John’s benefit, the placing just as John had specified, or rather nagged. 

Of course John was much easier to work with when he was kept happy. He could be quite unreasonable and stubborn otherwise. If it would stop John’s complaining it would be worth it to keep up the extra effort, he decided. 

*

The dimple on John’s cheek only occurred during 73% of his smiles.  
Sherlock wondered when and why his brain had decided to calculate such a figure.

*

One of the most surprising things about John was that he made lulls in the work tolerable. He was endlessly fascinating in his simplicity and normality. His morning routine hardly ever differed, whether working or not. The only exception being the nights he woke up with nightmares. Sherlock knew every tell for John’s nightmares.

John also didn't mind (much) when Sherlock took to dissecting the dull shows that he insisted on watching. Except for the one about the alien doctor (who didn't seem to look like an alien at all), that one required complete silence on Sherlock’s part. Sherlock knew quite intimately John’s ‘Don’t you dare!’ face.

The only downside to John was that he, like most ordinary people, insisted on going out on dates. If that wasn't bad enough, the women he chose were completely dull and predictable. Sherlock was at a complete loss as to how John could justify spending money on them when he was always complaining about their lack of it in reference to food and rent.

*

The door had only just closed behind them when John burst into laughter. They had just returned from a crime scene where the witness had turned out to be the thief they were looking for. John and Sherlock had chased after him and John had ended up tackling him to the ground. It was a warm and joyful laugh that made John’s whole body shake and forced him to rest his hand against the wall for balance. Just watching him was enough to cause Sherlock to laugh with him, a warm sensation flooding the centre of his chest. They grinned at each other as the laughter faded.   
Soon after, John moved towards the kitchen to make tea while Sherlock slouched into his armchair, still smiling.

*

Months ago when Moriarty had promised to burn the heart of him, Sherlock had been convinced there had been nothing to burn. It was much, much later when Sherlock had realised his heart came in the shape of a loyal and stupidly brave, ex-army doctor.

Sherlock had few people in his life that he actually cared for. Those that crept in, he cared for very much and this was a revelation in itself.  
When the three he cared for most were threatened. When there was only one way to get rid of the threat for good, he took it. He had calculated many possible scenarios, but standing on the roof of St Barts, with Moriarty’s body lying in a growing puddle of blood, there was only one viable solution. He made sure everyone was where he wanted them to be, said goodbye to John and jumped.


	2. What is home?

The last two years may not have been the worst in his life, but they were definitely a close second. The worst would, in hindsight, remain the years he had spent dependant on cocaine without even the work to keep his brain occupied. So no, they weren’t the worst, but they were certainly the loneliest. It was true that you couldn’t comprehend how much you would miss something until that thing was taken away. It had taken being separated from John for Sherlock to realise how much he valued John and the companionship.

For two years he had worn disguises and used stealth to infiltrate various organisations operating with or under Moriarty. He had conversed with no one but strangers, and only in his pursuit to deceive. While the majority of his mental capacity had been focused on his work, the tiniest bit was left to thoughts of John and keeping his body fuelled and rested. He couldn’t keep John safe if his body failed.

*********

586 days after his fall was when he had first felt it. Sherlock had been confined to his hotel room for two days, lying low after raising suspicion from the target he was currently tracking.

He had been sprawled out over the room’s single bed, utterly bored and listless when his mind had drifted to thoughts of John. The felling of longing had been almost overpowering. He wished John was there with him so he could wrap his arms around him and feel the warmth of his body against his own. He wished to rest his head against John’s chest and study his heartbeat, to know the rate at rest and then again after an exhilarating case. Sherlock wanted to catalogue anything about John that the other man would allow.

These thoughts had shocked him as he had never thought about another person like this before. Sherlock had never been one for unnecessary touching, especially not the affectionate kind. 

There had been concessions made for Mrs Hudson, the dear old lady, though annoying, would always be more to him than merely his land lady. Mrs Hudson was usually the one to initiate the affectionate touches and so he was certain she would respond favourably if he ever felt the need to return the gesture.  
Would John be accepting of his affection? Would he allow Sherlock to sit against him while they watched completely inane television? Or would he lean away, confused or consider it a beach of his boundaries for personal space?

John was always quite adamant that he wasn't gay. He was always the first to deny they were in a relationship to anyone who claimed that opinion. Would it make a difference if his advances weren’t sexually motivated? Sherlock was quite certain he didn’t want to have sex with John.

Sherlock rolled over and pressed his forehead into the pillow with his eyes closed tight. He ordered his brain to stop with the questions. It would be impossible to resolve the issue without more data, and until he arrived back at Baker Street it was useless to speculate. 

*********

It was done. Mycroft had found him beaten and bloody. The two years on the run had left Sherlock exhausted both physically and mentally. He had been so tired of running and he’d let himself slip, only to be captured.

His back ached with still scabbing wounds and bruises, so much that it was agony to lean back in his seat. Despite this, all he could think about during the flight back to London was John and how relieved he was to be going home. 

********

When Mycroft had told him that John was no longer living at 221B, he had been genuinely shocked and somewhat hurt. Logically it made sense that John would no longer be able to afford the rent. It took him even longer to realise that perhaps the memories of his dead friend may have been too much for John to remain in their shared apartment indefinitely.


	3. John

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Longer chapter this time, and some dialogue! Sorry for being a little late, Hope you enjoy!

Tracking John down had been easy. He was working at a new GP clinic and had moved into a small terrace further out from the city. Strange, even further out, John still shouldn’t be able to afford an apartment like that on his own. Disregarding this fact for now, Sherlock was currently memorising John’s work schedule, along with the possible train and bus routes that stopped within walking distance to the clinic and John’s new home. 

The next day he knew exactly when John would be home from work and was waiting slightly down the road, watching for his arrival. Sherlock’s heart was beating much faster than the situation warranted and he was beginning to feel nauseous. He dismissed the nausea as being caused by the fact that he hadn’t eaten for over 20 hours. Surely he couldn’t be feeling sick at the thought of seeing John again.

The security photograph of John that Mycroft had provided showed a man with a few more lines around his eyes and mouth, with more grey mingling with the blond hairs on his head. Also there was that horrible moustache. That would have to go, it aged him terribly. He looked healthy though, if a few pounds heavier than Sherlock had left him. Sherlock was so focused on the bus stop that he almost missed the car that pulled up in front of John’s new house. He was especially not prepared to see the short blonde woman who got out of the driver’s seat. Sherlock was frozen on the spot as he watched the couple walk up the few steps to their front door and disappear inside.

The evidence had been right before his eyes, but he had been ignoring this particular deduction in the hopes that another explanation would present itself. John lived in a nice neighbourhood in an apartment that he couldn’t afford on his own. There were plants in pots by the door, obviously well look after. John would never remember to water them let alone trim them. John was living with a woman in an apartment that was much too big for one person and even if he could afford it; he wouldn’t have chosen to live here alone. John wouldn’t live with a woman unless they were in a long term relationship.

It seemed that John had moved on during Sherlock’s absence, and as ridiculous as it seemed, Sherlock had never anticipated that outcome. Not really wanting to deal with that thought just yet, Sherlock strode over to the door and knocked.

“Hello, can I help you?” asked the person on the other side cautiously. 

She had a kind face and short, yet feminine, blonde hair. She was slightly shorter than John, (he never had liked to date women much taller than himself). She worked as a nurse at the same surgery as John. More deductions came to him, but Sherlock pushed them to the back of his mind for later.

“I,” Sherlock was surprised to find himself at a loss for words.

“Who is it?” John asked from inside the sitting room.

“Come and see for yourself John,” he managed to call out.

There was a few seconds of silence followed by hurried footsteps.

“What? John!” The woman exclaimed as John moved her out of the way. When he saw who was at the door, his face frozen in a look of shock or horror, it was hard to tell. He started at Sherlock for a few moments, corner of his mouth twitching as his emotions changed from shock to anger. That had always been easy to read on Johns face.

“Hello John.”

“No, no, no,” mumbled John.

“Oh! You’re,” a look of recognition came over the woman’s face.

“Yes,” Sherlock confirmed.

John suddenly lunged at Sherlock, fist slamming into his nose. It was a near thing that Sherlock didn’t end up falling down the stairs. Pain blossomed from the centre of his face and blood trickled down over his mouth. It was an effort not to swallow it while trying to breath.

“John!” John’s girlfriend exclaimed. She reached forward to grab Johns arm and urged him back inside. “Let’s take this inside hum?”

Sherlock had grabbed his nose with both hands, teeth grinding against the pain.

“R yoo dun?” Sherlock asked.

John seemed somewhat calmer but he continued to stare at Sherlock, breathing heavily. The woman had run off and returned with a towel and a freezer pack. Sherlock took them gratefully. John’s girlfriend led them both inside to the kitchen where Sherlock fell into a seat at the small table. He leant forwards and held the towel tightly over his nose while applying pressure. He briefly noted that the kitchen had a breakfast bar, why would you need a breakfast bar when there was a perfectly serviceable table mere feet from it? 

“Oh my god. I don’t even,” John was pacing back and forth through the small dining space. “This whole time, and you left me to believe you were dead Sherlock! Made me watch as you…” John choked on his next few words. “You bastard! Do you even know what it did to me to see that? Did you even care?” John sat at one of the two stools at that impracticable breakfast bar.

“I hab gone thoo evry variable, Mooriaty gabe e no choice, oo wood be dead and I wood neber hab been able oo take down his web as I hab done,” Sherlock tried to explain while still holding his now slightly swollen nose.

“What do you mean, I would be dead?” John interrupted.

Sherlock paused a moment to inspect his nose. When it was clear the bleeding had stopped he removed the towel. 

“Moriarty had assassins trailing you, Mrs Hudson and Lestrade. A sniper was likely aiming at you as you stood watching me on the roof. If I didn’t jump, didn’t die in the eyes of the world, you would now be dead. I thought I could get Moriarty to call them off, outsmart him somehow but I hadn’t anticipated his desire to win would extend to killing himself. Of course faking my death had the added benefits of being able to take down the whole web of operatives and organisations Moriarty was controlling or involved with. My death had to be believable of course, to fool everyone that knew me, to fool the public and most of all to fool Moriarty’s assassins."

A few seconds of silence sat between them.

“You could have told me, “John’s tone was hard.

Sherlock shook his head and looked John straight in the eye. “I wish I could have. The only person I had contact with was Mycroft and it was only months after I had left, and only when I needed help out of a difficult situation.”

John grit his teeth at the mention of Mycroft. “It was safe enough to get into contact with the brother you hate, but not to me?” he asked.

“I would rather not have, of course but I wouldn’t have been able to continue otherwise. It was a last resort, I assure you. Contacting you would have put you in danger; it was simply not worth the risk. I was only able to get though everything because I had no one but myself to worry about. It helped to know you were safe,” Sherlock explained.

John breathed deeply and broke eye contact with Sherlock. “I can’t. It’s a lot to take in you realise and my god! Two years Sherlock! I’m going to need some time. I think you should leave now,” his last sentence was spoken quietly. When he turned back to look at Sherlock his face showed a mix of emotions.

“I, alright,” said Sherlock after a pause. “I’d best let Mr’s Hudson know I’m back. I’ll be at Baker Street.” Sherlock caught himself before he could say, ‘If you need me.’  
He didn’t wait for John to reply, but walked past him and out the front door without looking back.

It was only halfway to Baker Street that he realised he hadn’t found out the name of John’s girlfriend.


	4. Mrs Hudson

Sherlock’s meeting with Mrs Hudson had gone much better than his one with John. After standing on the doorstep for at least a minute, he had eventually knocked. Evidently Mrs Hudson had realised someone had been lurking at her door and had greeted him with a shriek and a frying pan. 

This, he thought afterwards, was also probably due to the late hour. It had gotten dark while he had been at John’s and he hadn’t realised how much time had passed since then. Sherlock was lucky that in her shock, she had frozen, the frying pan raised, but she didn’t swing. He gently took it from her and led her back inside her apartment and put the pan on the kitchen bench.

“Hello Mrs Hudson,” he smiled at her. 

“Oh my, Sherlock!” she exclaimed while rushing at him with her arms outstretched.

Mrs Hudson enveloped him in a hug and Sherlock struggled not to react to the pain it was causing his injuries. Luckily she wasn’t strong enough to cause much harm and he happily hugged back, not letting go for several seconds. When they pulled apart she was wiping tears from her eyes.

“Sherlock Holmes I don’t want to go through thinking you dead ever again!” she smacked his arm, but there wasn’t any heat behind it.

“I am truly sorry Mrs Hudson. I didn’t want to deceive you, but I did what I did to keep you all safe form Moriarty,” he explained.

“Oh that horrible man, he’s gone for good now?” she asked as she walked over to the kettle.

“He is,” Sherlock confirmed.

“Good. That was such terrible business you got yourself into Sherlock. Now that you’re back I do so hope you won’t be getting into any more trouble.”

“The trouble usually finds me Mrs Hudson,” he replied while moving to sit at the table.

She laughed, though it sounded weak. “Oh, I can't deny that. Well you’re alive and back and that’s all that matters for now,” she carried two mugs over to the table. “Now, Sherlock you look like you haven’t been taking care of yourself, all skin and bones. I’ll get you something to eat and I won’t take no for an answer.”

Sherlock found himself smiling; he hadn’t felt so at ease with someone in such a long time.

As she went about fixing him a sandwich she kept glancing back at him with tears glistening in her eyes. Sherlock happily sipped his tea and watched her work. She returned to the table with a sandwich and plate of biscuits.

“I’m afraid I don’t have anything more at the moment,” she said, setting the plates down at the table.

“It’s perfect Mr’s Hudson.” Sherlock took half of the sandwich.

“Not a word while you eat. Afterwards you’re telling me everything about what’s happened.”

*********

Mrs Hudson had been so delighted to have him back, that after their conversation she insisted upon making up his old bed in 221B; she wouldn’t have him stay anywhere else.  
Any belongings that hadn’t been given away had been boxed up and taken by Mycroft after John had moved out. Mrs Hudson had tried and failed to rent out the apartment and in the process had patched up the wall with new wall paper. The furniture was all the same though, so even without any of his personal belongings it felt to Sherlock like coming home.

He texted Mycroft and told him to bring his belongings over before he went to bed. The only thing that would make him feel more at home would be John, but no, he couldn’t think about that right now.

Sherlock flopped stomach down onto the couch. It was the first time since he had arrived back in London that he could completely relax. Exhaustion seemed to settle heavily upon his body mixing with the pains from his still healing injuries. It felt so good to just lie there without anything putting demands on his time. He began making plans on how best to approach Lestrade, but fell asleep mid-way though. 

*********

When Sherlock woke it was light outside. He sat up, hair flattened on one side and discovered a stack of boxes in front of the book case, and that someone, likely Mycroft’s assistant, had left a takeaway cup of coffee and one of those sandwiches in a plastic triangle box on the coffee table. It seemed his brother didn’t think him capable of finding food on his own. 

Going by the light coming through the window, Sherlock decided it was close to midday. He felt horrid, like he hadn’t slept at all. He grabbed for the still hot coffee and took a few long gulps before also grabbing the sandwich and moving to the desk. Mycroft had provided him with a new laptop and it lie there already fully charged. Sherlock had to grudgingly applaud his brother for the upgraded model, already installed with the programs that Sherlock regularly used.

The first thing Sherlock did was remove the tracking software his brother had added before accessing the internet. He needed to catch up on the news. What had the criminal classes been up to in his absence? The faster he got back into the game, the better. He was in desperate need of a distraction.


	5. Lestrade

The case Lestrade was currently involved in was so obvious it was painful. Sherlock was currently observing the forensics team as they swarmed over the bodies of the double homicide.

The bodies had been found in the home of someone who had been on holiday, but it was obvious to Sherlock that the homeowners had nothing to do with the scene they had found upon returning home from Europe. The house had simply been a convenient dumping ground for the killer. It was a rather short sighted attempt at diverting the blame.

Sherlock waited for Lestrade to start walking back towards his car, which was parked across the road from the house currently cordoned off. He had his phone pressed to his ear.

“It was the woman’s lover, I’m almost certain. You are wasting your time with the homeowners,” said Sherlock

Lestrade looked up, startled and dropped his phone.

“Careful, I don’t think they’ll be too pleased if you destroy another one so soon,” Sherlock said as he bent down to pick up the phone that now showed a dent in the casing.

“You bastard!” Lestrade swore before rushing forward to pull Sherlock into a hug.

Sherlock’s arms remained hanging uselessly at his sides, having not expected that reaction. From Mrs Hudson it was expected, but not from Lestrade. He was feeling wrong footed.

“You utter bastard,” Lestrade mumbled into his neck.

Since it didn’t seem like he wasn’t going to get go any time soon, Sherlock tentatively wrapped his arms around the other man.

When he pulled away Lestrade looked him over.

“I can’t believe he was right,” he laughed.

“Who was right?” Sherlock asked.

“Anderson, bloody Anderson,” Lestrade laughed again. “The poor sod,” he said, and there were tears in his eyes. “It’s bloody good to see you. Does John know?”

“I, yes, I spoke to him first.”

“Lestrade, we’ve found somethin’ you should see. Is everythin’ okay here?” a young officer asked. He was a new addition to the department and didn’t recognise Sherlock.

“Oh, yeah, all good here Johnsey. I’ll be back in a mo,” Lestrade nodded to the officer, who left to return to the crime scene. He turned back to Sherlock, “I’ve got to go, but I’ll be over tonight. You’ve got a lot to catch me up on. You back at Baker Street?”

“Yes. I’ll look forward to it,” Sherlock was surprised to note how much he was actually looking forward to it. “Best take this back, though it seems they’ve hung up,” he said, realising he was still holding the DI’s phone.

“Oh right, thanks. Better go, I’ll see you tonight.”

Sherlock waited until Lestrade had disappeared into the house before leaving the scene.

********

Lestrade arrived forty minutes later than his estimated time of arrival with a bag of Chinese takeaway in hand. Sherlock had watched his car pull up from the window and was still looking over the street as he listened to Lestrade’s footsteps ascending the stairs.

When he arrived, Lestrade dropped the bag onto the coffee table and strode over to Sherlock, pulling him into another hug. Thankfully for Sherlock, this one was brief.

“Still can’t believe you’re back,” Lestrade clapped him on the shoulder, grinning widely.

“Yes, It is good to be back,” Sherlock said honestly.

Lestrade had entered the kitchen and Sherlock could hear him rummaging through the cupboards.

“Left upper cabinet,” Sherlock instructed.

Lestrade soon returned with two plates and some cutlery, which he placed next to the food on the coffee table. He motioned for Sherlock to join him at the lounge before starting to unpack the boxes of food from the bag.

Sherlock took the time to observe Lestrade. The other man was tired, likely overworked, but happy. Obviously he was currently in a positive mood due to Sherlock’s return. Sherlock hadn’t realised Lestrade would miss him so much. Of course he knew they had a pleasant working relationship. He was important to Sherlock, but he had only realised how much after Moriarty had targeted Lestrade with his assassins. Obviously Sherlock meant more to Lestrade than he assumed, perhaps he did consider Sherlock a friend. Sherlock hadn’t considered that before.

It was obvious though that Lestrade’s life was happier now than it had been before Sherlock had left. Ah, his wedding ring was gone, how had he not noticed before? Obviously it had been some time since the split going by how faded the line on his finger was. Good for him, Sherlock had known all about Lestrade’s wife and her repeated infidelity.

“Take what you like, I got a bit of everything,” Lestrade said.

Sherlock let his deductions simmer at the back of his mind; there would be more time to analyse later. He speared himself a spring roll to start.

“So,” Lestrade spoke through a mouthful of sweet and sour pork, “explain.” He waved his empty form at Sherlock.

So Sherlock did. First he explained his fake suicide and Moriarty’s assassins. While he let Lestrade process that information he took the chance to grab a few dim sum.

“Shit. I can’t believe he had someone on the force. He’d seemed like such a nice guy, he brought me coffee. Then he just disappeared and I’d wondered. Holy shit.”

Sherlock nodded before going on to explain the rest of his two years away, without going into unnecessary personal details. He was especially vague on what had happened shortly before his return to London. It was obvious that Lestrade had noticed the lack of detail but was leaving it alone for now, simply taking in the big picture. Sherlock was grateful; he hadn’t quite sorted all the feelings that came with a lot of those experiences yet.

He distracted himself from that train of thought by helping himself to some chilli chicken and cashews.

“Blimey, I can’t even imagine. I guess I should be saying thank you for saving my life,” Lestrade said.

Sherlock simply nodded, not knowing what to say.

“How did John take it?”

Sherlock can’t help the expression on his face, he feels tense and apparently it shows more than he intended.

“Not well then,” Lestrade summarised.

“Not particularly well, no,” Sherlock admitted.

“I’m not surprised really, I mean if you’d only seen him after. Well anyway, Mary’s done him a world of good, I’m sure he’ll come around eventually,” Lestrade assured him.

“Mary?” Sherlock asked.

“Yeah, his girlfriend. He was a wreck before they met, but she’s been a good influence. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was news of an engagement soon,” said Lestrade.

Sherlock remembered the short blonde woman that John lived with. His girlfriend, yes, but Sherlock had never conceived the notion that John could get married. That John could have a wife.

“He’ll come around,” Lestrade reassured him, completely misinterpreting Sherlock’s frozen expression.

All for the better as far as Sherlock was concerned, but embarrassing for a man who called himself a detective. He couldn’t help but berate himself thoroughly. Two years ago there wouldn’t have been anything to read on his face. He was slipping.

Sherlock managed to get through the rest of the night without any more slip-ups. It was necessary with John being a common topic of interest between them.

After Lestrade had left, the only thing he could think about was John and Mary and marriage.


	6. Molly

It took a few days for Lestrade to wrap up the double homicide case. It went much quicker with Sherlock’s deductions but as Lestrade liked to remind him, the police actually needed evidence to convict someone, not just Sherlock’s say so. 

In the meantime Sherlock had resorted to taking on private clients, usually with laughably simple cases, but it was better than nothing. It was simply something to pass the time and help him ignore the fact that John had yet to contact him. Sherlock still couldn’t understand his feelings on the situation.

Sherlock understood passion and desire. It was imperative to his work that he did as it was one of the most common motivators in crime, especially murder. 

Of course Sherlock had always been above such physical desires. He found the idea of sex quite distasteful, the act messy and boring. He had often wondered how people could let their minds lose control, indeed he’d often wondered how it was even possible to keep their brains focused on one physical act.

He had attempted it of course, during his years at university. His motivation had been purely curiosity. The few times he’d tried had mostly ended before anything had a chance to really begin. Sherlock hadn’t deemed the experiment worthy of further repetition. In the end he had found it far more useful to his research if he studied the reactions of others.   
This was partially why his feelings for John had been so troubling. He had no personal experience with which to compare. Sherlock was rather certain that his feelings weren’t consistent with the regular terms of friendship. He definitely didn’t feel the same way about Lestrade or even Molly, who he had come to realise fit into most people’s definition of a friend.

It was hard to admit, but if he was ever going to solve this problem he would need the opinion of a person who was used to such interactions. That was the kinds of advice friends were good for, wasn't it?

********

A short cab ride later and Sherlock was entering the morgue at St Barts.

“I require information,” he announced as he pushed through the doors.

Molly, who had been returning a body to cold storage, jumped.

“Oh my god, Sherlock! You’re back!” she exclaimed, looking at him with wide eyes. She rushed to pull him into a hug. “I’ve been so worried.”

He awkwardly patted her on the back, not having expected such a dramatic reaction from her since she was one of the only people who had known he was alive the entire time.  
He wondered if this hugging thing was a common occurrence for friends.

“Sorry,” Molly said as she pulled back.

“It’s, ah, good to see you again Molly,” he said, waiting as she wiped her eyes.

“Right, you said you needed information?” She asked, quickly composing herself. It was one of the qualities Sherlock liked about her.

“Yes,” he confirmed, feeling better now the conversation was back to his original purpose. “You’ve got friends and you’ve dated, had boyfriends for a little while at least. You’re dating someone now in fact.”

“Oh, yes. His name is Tom, it’s been three months next week,” she confirmed.

“Excelent, that’s perfect.”

“Thanks, we’re very happy,” she beamed at him.

Sherlock briefly wondered what he’d said to make her so happy. He dismissed the thought and moved on.

“What can you tell me about the differences between a friendship and a romantic relationship,” he asked.

“Oh um,” she paused, looking puzzled. “Isn’t it, oh right, um. Well there’s the sex obviously.”

He scowled.

“Right, well I’d say you love your friends, but it’s different from being in love with them. If its romantic love then you’ll want to share everything with that person and think about them all the time; especially when they’re not there. Also, with me anyway, it can be different for other people of course, but I want to be physically close to them and affectionate. You know like cuddling and kissing,” she was blushing now, “well with Tom and I that’s what it’s like. With friends the feelings aren’t as intense; it’s not as close a relationship. You have things in common and you enjoy spending time with them but it’s easier to spend time apart. It’s ok if you don’t see each other as often.”

“So there isn’t that same desire to show affection towards someone you consider a friend,” he asked to be sure.

“Well, I mean it’s usually different between men and women. My girlfriends and I always hug when we greet each other and to say goodbye. Some people may kiss on the cheek, it’s a personal thing and sometimes cultural too. But that’s about it. It's sometimes different between two male friends though, I guess there's different ways to show affection. It usually depends on how close the friends are. You don't mind me hugging you, do you? What’s this all about Sherlock?”

Ignoring her questions Sherlock moved forward kiss Molly on the cheek. 

“Thank you Molly, you have been most helpful,” he said before he turned away and quickly exited the room.

Molly was left speechless for a few moments.

"Oh, you're welcome," she ended up saying to the still swinging door.


	7. Dinner?

Waiting was so tedious. Sherlock had just checked his phone for the fourth time that hour. It had been weeks and there had been no reply from John and no new cases from Lestrade. He hurled the device at the wall and it bounced off and landed on the couch.

Sherlock had just moved into the kitchen to make a cup of tea when the text alert chimed. He raced back to retrieve it, heart beat accelerating. When he saw it was Lestrade disappointment hit him hard and he struggled to shake it off. This could be interesting. Lestrade wanted him to look over a body at the morgue that afternoon. Sherlock quickly replied positively and decided to return to the kitchen to make tea while he waited.

A few agonising hours later there was still no reply from John, but Sherlock was now in the morgue at St Barts looking over the body of a yet unknown male, mid 30’s. What was interesting was the huge amount of post-mortem bruising. Completely wrong for a hit and run; which is what the body had originally been called in as.

An early morning commuter had been unfortunate enough to stumble across the body at the edge of an intersection. He had alerted the authorities who had initials assumed the poor man had been attempting to cross the road when he was struck down. From the photos of the scene Sherlock had just been shown, he couldn't understand how anyone could could come to that conclusion with both the angle the body and the injuries being inconsistent with that scenario.

What was confusing the police now was the fact that the man had been found with his entire body scrubbed clean and in newly bought clothes that had never been worn before, but were exactly his size. What they had found had been smears of dirt on his clothes and traces of diesel exhaust. That was the only clues they had found so far, but they weren’t getting very far. By the state of his teeth the man had never been to the dentist, nor had he had any kind of surgery that would make him easier to identify. Needless to say his fingerprints weren’t in the system and no DNA but his own had been found on his body or clothes.

Sherlock had asked for the clothes to be spread out on another table so he could examine the pattern of the dirt, in comparison to the bruising.

“It’s obvious that this man was dropped from a great height post mortem, the dirt on the clothes corresponds to the impact bruises.” Sherlock pointed to one of the x-rays of the man’s skull. “The impact has almost obscured this, but not quite. He was hit over the head with a heavy blunt object. Most definitely cause of death. Supposedly the killer thought dropping him from a height would cause enough extra damage to cover it up, but the impact wasn’t quite in the right location for that. It’s also obvious from the bruising that he fell not once, but twice. Some of the bruising happened possibly hours after the first lot."

Before Sherlock could continue explaining his deductions his phone buzzed from inside his jacket pocket. He put down the x-ray he’d been examining to retrieve it.

John. John had replied.

‘Are you free for dinner tomorrow night?’

‘Yes- SH’

He replied quickly. He didn’t have to wait long for another reply.

‘Ok, 6:30pm. My place’

Dinner with John, tomorrow night at his place. Sherlock’s stomach was doing its jumpy, slightly sick feeling again. It was quite unpleasant.

“Sherlock, you ok?” Lestrade asked, and damn it, he must be slipping again.

“Mhm, yes. Email me the x-rays and get Molly to send an analysis of the dirt on the man’s clothing. There’s nothing more I can get from the body,” he said absently as he picked up his coat from where he’d draped it over a chair.

It was only after he was on his way home that Sherlock realised he had forgotten to let Lestrade know just what he had learnt from the body.

He began composing a text:

‘Victim worked standing up, didn’t sleep much. His hands were dry, skin cracked, likely due to constant exposure to heat and moisture. That plus the small burn scars suggests someone working in a kitchen- SH.’

That should give them something to work on for now.

This thing with John was getting entirely too distracting.

********

Sherlock had spent the night alternating between pacing the apartment and lying prone on the couch. The television had been turned on but he hadn’t been able to concentrate on such idiotic drivel, so it had promptly been turned off again. Not long after, he moved to his arm chair and switched it back on with the volume turned down low. It had been too quiet in the apartment otherwise.

He hadn’t intended to fall asleep, but that’s just what happened. He was startled awake by the sound of the front door opening and Mr’s Hudson entering with a tea tray. He had fallen asleep sitting up and was slightly disoriented by the time difference. Last he remembered it had been night and he had been puzzling over Lestrade’s murder case. The television was still on and so too the desk lamp but sunlight was now spilling in through the windows.

The muscles in his neck protested when he moved.

“Oh, morning Sherlock, you’re up early. You’re usually still in bed when I bring up the tea,” Mr's Hudson said, once she noticed he was awake.

“Mmmm,” he mumbled in reply. He ran his hands through his hair. “That’s been you?”

“How did you think it got here?” she asked, equally amused and worried.

She tutted at the mess she had to move aside before she could put the tray down at the coffee table. She began picking up a collection of takeout containers Sherlock had been neglecting.

“It just sort of happened,” he waved his hand over the table at large before shifting closer so he could pick up the cup of tea. It was exactly as he liked it of course. She had even added some toast already spread with honey to the tray. He picked up a piece to nibble on as he watched her flit about the flat to pick up rubbish and tidy his mess.

He hadn’t really realised how much work John had put in to keeping their shared space tidy. Cleaning wasn’t something that usually occurred to Sherlock until he either tripped over something or the problem became too big for him to ignore. His brain had more interesting things to focus on. Having John around had forced him to become more aware of the physical pace that he occupied. It seemed he had fallen back into old habits.

Thinking about John reminded him that he would be meeting him for dinner. Were you supposed to bring something with you when invited to dinner? People sometimes brought wine, didn't they? He was sure he had heard that somewhere. But John didn’t drink wine.

He was too busy thinking to notice when Mr’s Hudson left. Eventually he decided that it would probably work in his favour to follow social conventions and find a dinner gift. John had often berated Sherlock for not acting in what he considered the correct manner in various social situations.

He jumped off the couch and hurried to shower and change before heading out to the shops.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to add the dinner to this chapter but that section was longer than this entire chapter. Hope everyone is enjoying this and thank you to all my readers, especialy thoes who have subcribed and left kudos! :D


	8. Dinner conversation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok so this is a day late, but it's also double the length of my usual chapters! Hope you all enjoy. :)

It was now the afternoon and he had just changed his shirt for the third time. A six pack of John’s favourite beer was sitting on the table. Sherlock was ready to go, but didn’t have to be there for a few hours yet. He was pacing the flat, feeling anxious and quite irritable. He had made a cup of tea and then forgotten about it,  having since flopped down on the couch.

Suddenly he was jerking awake, feeling disoriented with the sitting room light almost blinding above him. He didn’t recall falling asleep, certainly hadn’t intended to. The sky was now dark, his heart began to race. Had he slept through dinner? Finding his phone he realised he had only been asleep for an hour and a half. What was with his body and falling asleep all over the place? It was getting rather out of hand. He had never slept without intent unless he was completely exhausted or on drugs. 

Sherlock looked down and noticed his shirt had become wrinkled during sleep. He changed it again quickly before grabbing his coat and the beer before heading out to catch a cab. He would have to ponder on his sleeping habits later.

*******

Sherlock arrived at John and Mary’s 15 minutes early. Mary was the one to greet him at the door.

“Hello Sherlock, come in,” she smiled widely as she greeted him and gestured for him to follow her inside.

“Yes hello,” he handed her the beer.  “John doesn’t like wine, that’s his favourite beer. It’s a thankyou for dinner. That’s what people do isn’t it?

“I, yes, well thank you. I’m sure he’ll like that. John’s just popped round to the shops to get some last minute things, we weren’t expecting you so early,” she said as she led him to the sitting room.

“I’ll just pop these in the fridge. Do you want anything to drink?” she offered.

“No, thank you.”

“Well, make yourself comfortable, the remote for the telly is on the side table if you like. I’ll be in the kitchen finishing off dinner if you need anything,” she smiled brightly at him again before she left.

Sherlock’s eyes took in the room and everything it could tell him about John and Mary and their relationship. There were a lot of photographs positioned around the room, mostly of Mary and her friends but some of her and John with a group of mutual friends.

So far he could deduce that they had been together for 11 months, living together for two. After John had moved out of Baker Street he had rented a furnished studio and thus hadn’t much to bring with him to their new home. Of course John had only ever kept a small amount of belongings, a throwback to his time in the army. That knowledge, plus the design of the room made it obvious all the furnishing were either Mary’s from her last flat, or recently added by her in a similar style.

There were significant gaps in Mary’s photos suggesting an ex who’s photo’s Mary had neglected to add to her new home. It suggested a bad breakup, most likely infidelity on his part. Mary had met John five months later at the clinic they both worked at. Office romance, how predictable.

Sherlock looked at the photo’s containing John more closely; he was smiling in ever one, a genuine happy expression. They represented whole world in which John was happy and Sherlock was not a part. Somewhere in the middle of his chest something ached.

The front door opened and John entered, limping.

“I’m back. Got everything you asked, even though I don’t know why you needed- ” John paused when he spotted Sherlock in the sitting room.

“What?” John dropped the bags of shopping he'd been carrying.

“Mary pretended to be you. She borrowed your phone to invite me to dinner, and then deleted the messages,” said Sherlock. How had he been so blind? It was clear by the look of shock and anger on John’s face that he hadn’t been expected.

“John, I invited him over because you were avoiding the issue all together,” Mary had arrived in the corridor and placed a hand on John’s shoulder.

“So you haven’t forgiven me yet,” Sherlock said, feeling more disappointed than he would even admit to.

John made a motion towards him but was stopped by Mary’s hand tightening on his shoulder.

“You’ve been moping about it all week.”

“I have not!” was John’s offended reply. But he seemed to deflate when he saw the look on Mary’s face.

“You should have told me,” he said to her but it was obvious he had no ill feeling towards her over the deceit.

“Look, dinner is almost done, let’s all move to the table and I’ll be needing those berries I sent you out for,” she said before leaning in to kiss John on the cheek.

John gave Sherlock a look that was hard for even the detective to decipher.

“Best do what she wants then,” he said before gathering the shopping and following his girlfriend, with Sherlock closely behind.

There was something baking in the oven, Italian going by the lingering scent of garlic, onions and a tomato based sauce. Sherlock’s stomach gurgled, but thankfully not loud enough for either of his hosts to hear.

Mary was opening the packet of berries at the bench and John was getting cutlery out of the draw to set the table. Sherlock stopped and hovered in the doorway, unsure about what he should be doing, or if he should be doing anything at all.

“Sit down would you,” John said while gesturing towards the table.

Sherlock pulled out one of the chairs and sat stiffly.

“What have you been up to since you returned to London?” the question came unexpectedly from Mary. She had now added the berries and some apple slices to a pot with some sugar to stew. It smelled heavenly.

“I’ve started taking private clients again, though most are laughable simple to solve. I’m also consulting for Lestrade on a moderately interesting case. A man was found dead in the middle of the road, clearly not a hit and run; in fact he was dead hours before he was found,” Sherlock explained.

“Could he have been on top of a vehicle and fallen off when they turned the corner? Sort of like the Andrew West case, do you think?” John pondered. Once he finished setting the table he took the seat across from Sherlock.

“Very good John, yes. Though this time it will be much harder to trace back where he came from.”

“It would have to of been a lorry, otherwise someone would have seen it, not least the driver,” Mary put in.

“I, yes most likely,” Sherlock answered. He had been so focused on John he had temporarily forgotten Mary was in the room.

“You should go with him John, next time there’s something to investigate,” Mary suggested.

Sherlock could hear her opening the oven and taking things out to set on the bench, before putting something else in.

“I’ll think about it,” said John, though he leant back, as if only now realising how engaged he had become in the conversation.

“Oh and Sherlock brought over some beer, said it was your favourite. I popped it in the fridge when he arrived so it should be cold by now,” Mary said as she plated up.

“Oh right,” John looked at Sherlock, clearly surprised, before getting up to look in the fridge. “Hey, they are my favourite; I hadn’t thought you ever paid attention,” he sounded delighted and Sherlock wished he could see John’s face.

“Don’t suppose you want one Sherlock? I don’t think I ever saw you drink beer the whole time we lived together,” John asked, he was now standing with two bottles in hand.

“No, I’ll be happy with water tonight, you’ll enjoy them more than I will.”

Sherlock had never been partial to beer, it is true, but he also knew it was probably not a good idea for him to lose any inhibitions tonight.

“Cheers,” John put one of the bottles back and returned to the table. He removed the lid and took a swig.

“Here you go, John’s told me about Angelo’s, I hope my lasagne is up to your standards,” Mary said as she sets the plates on the table.

“It smells divine, I’m sure you have done a marvellous job,” said Sherlock.

John was looking at him oddly. Wasn't he supposed to compliment the cook? Was the compliment too much? It did in fact smell good, even though the portion size was massive, much larger than what he would have selected for himself. John would have known not to serve him as much.

“Thanks darling,” John said. He smiled at Mary with affection shining in his eyes.

Sherlock’s heart chose that moment to start beating faster and he suddenly felt out of place, though he couldn't pin point why. For something to do he cut into his lasagne, and it did taste delicious, but for some reason he found it hard to swallow.

The meal continued with small talk mostly between John and Mary, and Sherlock making sure he engaged just enough to seem polite.

Sherlock had also managed to eat about a third of the lasagne plus some of the side vegetables, mostly to appease John. When John put down his fork for the last time Sherlock gratefully did the same. He took a large sip of water to try to ease the sticky feeling in his mouth.

“Not hungry?” Mary asked.

“As wonderful as it was, I am quite full. Thank you Mary,” he praised.

“If you’re sure, I guess I’m just used to John’s appetite,” she said.

“Oh yes, John does eat quite a lot,” Sherlock said, and it comes out without him really intending to say as much.

“Oi!” Protested John, but there was no heat behind it. “You only think that because you hardly eat anything, you beanpole,” John teased with unexpected affection.

Sherlock is momentarily taken aback.

“Here, I’ll box that up for you and you can take it home,” Mary said as she collected all their plates.

“Oh, thank you,” Sherlock said while putting on his best smile, hoping John can't tell it’s the fake smile he uses on clients. But no, John isn’t looking at him.

“John tried to talk me out of making pudding, but I wanted to make something anyway. The pie should be done by now. Any chance you could fit some in?” Mary looked at Sherlock sweetly.

Sherlock glanced at John who's mood has improved greatly since the start of the night. So how can he say no when John seemed to be warming to him again.

“A little bit,” Sherlock conceded.

The pie had been as good as the main, and thankfully Mary had given him a small slice that he had managed to finish. John was on his third beer and was now smiling at both Mary and Sherlock. Even so, Sherlock knew it was time for him to leave, and told his host’s as such.

“It’s been a pleasure having you, you’ll have to come round more often,” said Mary as they walked Sherlock to the door.

“It would be a pleasure,” he replied.

“Well I’ll leave you two to say goodbye,” Mary’s smile looked smug. She believed her dinner plan had been a success. Looking at John now, Sherlock had to grudgingly admit that she was correct.

John led Sherlock out the door and closed it behind them.

“Thank you for that, in there, it was good. I wasn’t expecting, well anyway, you’re usually rude to my girlfriends, so ah, thank you,” said John.

Sherlock wasn’t sure how to respond to that so asked instead, “I suppose I’ll be seeing you again soon?” and instantly hated how hopeful he sounded.

“Yeah of course, I’ll never hear the end of it from Mary if she hears, but she was right. I did miss you, I was just too angry to admit it to myself. I’ll text you when I have a day free,” John admitted.

They said their final goodbyes and Sherlock left to find a cab.

*******

Back at Baker Street Sherlock noted that Mrs Hudson was out. She seemed to be absent more often lately; off to some raffle, book club or bingo, whatever it was that old women did.

He hurried up the stairs, footsteps echoing loudly in the otherwise quiet building. He unlocked the door to 221B and entered without bothering to turn on the light. Instead he dropped the box of food on the couch and walked straight to where he had left his violin case by the windows. He ended up playing until his fingers turned numb.


	9. A case of secrets

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry this is late, I've come to the end of the chapters I've already written and it's taking a bit longer than I hoped to write. Fear not, I almost have the next chapter done too.  
> Also I'm Australian, and even though I try to research the correct words and slang to use, sometimes I'll probably miss some. If anything is glaringly obviously wrong you can feel free to let me know.
> 
> Now for some crime solving!

It had taken a couple of days to solve Leatrade’s murder case. It was only after the man’s concerned co-workers had filed a missing person’s report for a man named Peter Miller that they were able to make a positive identification. Peter had worked in a pub kitchen in Knightsbridge. When he failed to turn up for work two days in a row his Boss had called his emergency contact, his sister, and found out she hadn’t heard from him in days.

With this new information it was easy for Sherlock to piece together where Peter had been when he disappeared. Peter had been spotted on CCTV footage getting on a train after work the night before he went missing. According to his co-workers, he had been headed to his girlfriend’s flat to surprise her for her upcoming birthday. Tracking his movements on the CCTV footage confirmed that his girlfriends flat was the most likely destination.

Peter’s girlfriend was a young nurse named Sophia Harrington. When she was interviewed she told police she been at work that night at a 24 hour clinic. Her shift hadn’t ended until 2am and she claimed to not have seen Peter when she got home. Her alibi checked out but Sherlock could tell she knew more than she was letting on.

Upon inspecting her flat Sherlock had found evidence that not only did another woman stay over quite regularly, but a round object was missing from a side table in the living room, removed recently going by the  clean circle made on the otherwise dusty surface.

“No John?” Lestrade asked casually as they inspected the flat. “You two have made up, haven’t you?”

Sherlock felt a painful twinge in his chest at the question. “Working,” he replied shortly. He had informed John of the fact that he was going out but had yet to receive a reply. Sherlock kept turning to where he expected John to be, ready to clue him in on his deductions and then remembering that he wasn’t there.  

“I’ve heard Watson’s finally in a steady relationship, settling down. Is it really such a surprise that he may not want to run around after him anymore, especially after everything that he went through two years ago,” put in Donovan from where she was standing in the doorway to the apartment.

“Donovan,” Lestrade warned.

She shrugged, “Just saying it like it is. Watson took your death harder than anyone, not to mention the fact that he almost got killed multiple times just by being associated with you. Being friends with someone is one thing, getting back into the detective business is a whole other matter,” she said, actually speaking to Sherlock this time.

It hadn’t occurred to Sherlock that John wouldn’t want to get involved in the work again. It was obvious he still craved the excitement as evidence by his reoccurring limp. Could he just want a boring life with Mary? Was that why he hadn’t replied to the text?

Over the last few days Sherlock had texted John many times about the case, and also sometimes just because he was bored. It usually took John a long time to reply, often reminding Sherlock they he couldn’t text during work hours. Occasionally he would reply back with his opinion on whatever Sherlock had asked, but it was always much too late, when Sherlock had already solved that part of the puzzle, or had moved on to something else.

Sherlock pushed that thought aside, John had only just forgiven him, so perhaps it would take a bit more time before he was willing to come to crime scenes again. He was trying to be involved, when he did reply. Besides, John had gotten used to a quiet life in Sherlock’s absence; He would just have to ease him out of it.

Sherlock spotted a small piece glass on the floor; it was under the couch, almost obscured by the leg and the dust that had accumulated around it.  

“You try to clean up all the pieces but it’s all too easy to miss a few,” he picked up the piece carefully in his gloved hand. “See if you can find any more pieces,” he instructed. Thoughts of john temporally pushed away as the puzzle pieces of the case started to come together.

They did find 2 more pieces of glass mostly hidden in the carpet or under the furniture, as well as a few specks of what could only be blood.

“Miller was hit over the head by a heavy glass vase, the one that was previously sitting on the side table. I’m also certain that it has something to do with the other woman who was staying over, likely Miss Harrington has a girlfriend that Miller didn’t know about,” explained Sherlock. He had once again started to turn to where he imagined John should be, but realised what he was doing at the last minute and instead turned to Lestrade.

“A girlfriend?" Lestrade asked, sounding puzzled. “And how can you tell another woman was staying here?”

Sherlock sighed, seriously how did other people manage being so unobservant? “Yes, a girlfriend, Miss Harrington is bisexual. There were two different sets of hair products in the bathroom, and clothes in her wardrobe that are obviously not hers, not to mention the tea in the kitchen. Harrington has a packet of chai tea in her cupboard; it’s relatively unused. In contrast her favourite tea, earl grey, sits in a tin on the counter. Miller didn’t have any tea in his flat at all, only coffee, so it’s obviously not for him. It’s entirely likely that she assumed he wouldn’t notice, if you’re anything to go by  then I’m certain that she was right and Miller had no idea his girlfriend was also dating another woman. From the fact that this other woman has some of her things here I would say that that she was Miss Harrington’s main partner and that she was in fact cheating on her girlfriend with Miller,” Sherlock explained.

“Oh right,” Said Lestrade. He turned to Donovan, “Let’s find out who the other woman is,” he instructed.

Talking to Sophia’s neighbours, it was confirmed that another woman was seen visiting on a regular basis.

In the end they did find Sophia’s girlfriend, a Miss Julia Berry. It seemed that Julia had been equally ignorant of Sophia’s infidelity. She had entered the flat while Peter was already there. Assuming him to be a burglar she had grabbed the vase off the side table and hit Peter over the head with it, before dropping it to the floor where parts of the rim broke off.

Sophia had returned home from her shift at the clinic to find Peter dead and Julia distraught. She had then helped the other woman clean and redress Peter’s body in new clothes to get rid of the blood, before pushing him off her 6th story balcony, hoping to make his death look like an accident. Sophia, it appeared was an avid watcher of crime drama’s.

 They hadn’t counted on the fact that a dustbin lorry was currently sitting below. Peter’s body had landed on its roof while the estate’s bins were busy being emptied. There was nothing the two women could do to get Peter’s body, and the lorry driver remained oblivious to his unintended cargo.   

Eventually Peter’s body had fallen off the lorry, where it had later been found in the middle of the road.

Both women had been charged.

******

When Lady Smallwood approached Sherlock with her blackmail case, the Peter Miller case was just being wrapped up and he was ready for a new challenge. Charles Augustus Magnussen was definitely an interesting character worthy of further investigation.


	10. Guy Fawkes Night

John’s last message had been to ask if Sherlock had any plans for the evening. Sherlock had told him that no, he hadn’t. His current case was in an important research phase which Sherlock could do happily from home.

Sherlock was extremely surprised when Mary came running up the stairs to 221B later that evening. It was around the time he had expected John to turn up, which put Sherlock on alert instantly.

Something had happened to John, that much was obvious. Sherlock was finding it unusually hard to concentrate on the puzzle. Not when the face of the puzzle was John and the consequences of his failure could be his death. All Sherlock could remember was the last time John had been targeted by Moriarty. This time he didn’t even know who had taken John or for what purpose.

He forced himself to focus on the coded message Mary was showing him. He remembered John questioning why he wasn’t thinking of Moriarty’s bomb victims as individuals, rather than a piece of a puzzle to be solved. But caring had never been an advantage for Sherlock and his sentiment was certainly acting as a hindrance now.

Sherlock managed to push his personal feelings aside, sealing them away in a room in his mind palace. Right now Sherlock needed his analytical mind, not his emotional one.

*******

It was a rush as Sherlock and Mary sped down the road on the motorbike. Sherlock was constantly updating their route until he could find the quickest possible way to John. Find John, save John. John, John, John.

Sherlock’s heart was pounding heavily and his panic was bashing away on the door in his mind palace.

_Things are hotting up here._

He spotted the bonfire and all his panic broke free. Without realising, Sherlock had stopped the bike and hopped off. It had probably fallen over, he didn’t care, he had even forgotten about Mary who had been seated behind him. He pushed past the crowd of confused people and lunged towards the fire. He didn’t even take notice the heat as he dug into the pile of burning wood. Sherlock had not saved John’s life from Moriarty and sacrificed two years of his own life for John either suffocate (more likely), or burn to death now.

John was alive, coughing and spluttering, but alive. The relief felt like a wave of water splashing over him and soaking him to the bone. Sherlock could feel his eyes stinging with tears, but it wasn’t clear if that was because of the smoke or his turbulent emotional state.

All Sherlock wanted to do was pull John into his arms and hold him tight, press his ear to John’s chest and listen to his heart beating, to know he was alive.

But Mary was already there, her arms around John. Sherlock was left wanting, but not knowing what to do about it. He ended up crouching by Mary’s side, not taking his eyes off John for a second and tracking rise and fall of his chest. He didn’t move until the ambulance turned up and paramedics eased John from Mary’s arms.

An ambulance, why hadn’t he thought to call an ambulance? Of course John could be suffering from smoke inhalation. Of course he could have injuries from his abduction. Sherlock had been so frozen in his relief at simply finding John alive that he hadn’t thought about John’s future needs.

Neither it seemed had Mary. Sherlock had to grudgingly admit he was grateful to whichever idiot in the crowd had thought to call 999.

*******

John was let out of hospital mere hours after he arrived. There wasn’t as much damage as first thought, and certainly not as much as what could have happened if John had been left in the fire any longer. John was sent home to rest and told to take a few days off work. Sherlock just wished that John’s home was somewhere where he could keep an eye on him, rather than having to rely on Mary.

Sherlock spent the next few days texting back and forth with John. They didn’t always talk about anything in particular. John was bored and restless; he couldn’t wait to get back to work. Neither could Sherlock, but he couldn’t help but wish that when John said work, he meant work with Sherlock and not work at a surgery on the other side of town.

*******

He had arrived at 221B with a smile on his face so wide that Sherlock was momentarily taken aback. He hadn’t anticipated anything in John’s life to cause such a reaction. In fact John was going back to work the next day and had temporarily taken up his cane again.

“I finally asked her,” John said as he entered the flat. He sat down in his old arm chair and he looked so comfortable there, so at home, that for a moment it felt to Sherlock like he had never left. If only.

“Asked who what?” Sherlock asked. He was in the kitchen working on an experiment, testing the corrosive effects of stomach acid. It was just something to pass the time really.

“Mary, I asked her to marry me and she said yes,” John was looking over his shoulder at Sherlock and beaming. “After all that happened the other day I just thought, well why wait.”

“You’re engaged, to be married?” Sherlock asked. He had frozen mid motion with his tongs in hand.

“Yes, I asked her to dinner last night. We’ve been through a lot together and if she doesn’t go running when I get kidnapped and put into a bonfire, well she’s probably a keeper,” John continued, oblivious to Sherlock's emotional turmoil.

Sherlock actually jumped when Mr’s Hudson started speaking, not having heard her walking up the stairs. The piece of kidney he’d been holding with the tongs went splat onto the table.

“I heard you come in John, so I thought I’d bring you boys something. You really should drop by more often John, Sherlock’s been sulking about something terrible. Much better since you’ve made up though.”

“Oh, Mr’s Hudson I was going to stop by on my way out to tell you; I asked Mary to marry me and she said yes!” John informed her, before happily picking up a piece of the carrot cake from the tray she was still holding.

“Oh, I thought you had just made up with Sherlock?” She asked, setting the tray down at the small table between the arm chairs and sitting down.

“What? Yes I have, what’s that got to do with it?” John asked, puzzled.

Mrs Hudson looked from Sherlock, who was now trying to look like he was carrying on with his experiment, and back to John.

“I just thought, well, never mind. Engaged! Well it’s just a bit of a shock isn’t it?” she said, sounding a little flustered.

“Why would it be a shock? We’ve been living together for months, she’s the longest relationship I’ve ever had,” John replied, obviously thrown by her reaction to what he seemed to think was fabulous news.

“You forget that I haven’t seen you for a long while. If only you had visited more often. But never mind that now. A Wedding, It is exciting news, isn’t it Sherlock?” she turned to him now.

Sherlock merely grunted in reply. He was trying too hard to appear indifferent to the conversation to come up with something intelligent to say. The joy he had previously feeling about having John well, and back in his life again was mixing with an ugly negative emotion that was leaving him feeling partially hollow inside. Such an absurd thing to be feeling.

Mrs Hudson waved a hand in Sherlock’s direction. “Don’t mind him dear. Oh I remember when I got married. It was a wonderful time,” she said.

“I don’t think you’re the perfect advocate for a happy marriage,” Sherlock couldn’t help but point out. Perhaps with a bit more bitterness than he had been intending.

“Yes well, it was a fantastic experience at the time, such a whirlwind, and just because we didn’t work out doesn’t mean you and Mary wont,” she reassured John.

“Um, yes well thanks. Anyway what I wanted to say is that you’re invited, I couldn’t imagine getting married without you there,” he said.

“Oh John, It would be my pleasure. I’m sure it will be lovely,” she smiled kindly at him. “Anyway I’d best go; I’ll leave you boys to it.”

“Alright, it’s been good to see you Mr’s Hudson. I’ll have to bring Mary round so you can meet properly,” John suggested.

“Of course,” she said, though she glanced at Sherlock before she left and she looked almost worried but Sherlock couldn’t tell precisely why.


	11. Best man?

John got up and moved to sit at the kitchen chair by Sherlock.

“Can you stop for a sec?” he asked, eying the piece of kidney still on the table. “That’s the one thing I don’t miss about living here, having to put up with your experiments taking up the entire kitchen.”

“Yes well, since you haven’t been here,” Sherlock shrugged and gestured to the kitchen at large.

“I bet you’re loving it, having all the space to yourself. Not having me nagging about keeping the fridge safe for food,” John joked.

Sherlock didn’t know what to say to that. He was in fact still boxing and labelling his samples in the fridge. That and he was still half expecting (hoping) to wake up in the morning and find John had moved part of his equipment off the table.

“Right, anyway the reason I came by, I just couldn’t wait. I need a best man for my wedding,” said John, moving on when Sherlock remained silent.

“Gavin?” Sherlock suggested, slightly confused as to why John would be asking his opinion. Sherlock wasn’t a fan of weddings and thought that should be a pretty obvious fact to everyone who knew him. It didn’t help that the thought of John’s wedding in particular was producing some rather confusing emotions for Sherlock.

“Who?” John asked.

“Gavin Lestrade? He’s a man and good at it,” Sherlock clarified.

“It’s Greg, and he’s not my best friend,” John sounded exasperated.

Maybe, perhaps?

“Oh, Mike Stamford then?” had to ask, just to be sure.

“No, Mike’s great but he’s not my best friend,” said John. “Look Sherlock, It’s you, you’re my best friend. I want you to be my best man. If I’m getting married I want you by my side,” John said.

He was John’s best friend? When had that happened? He hadn’t though John was that fond of him anymore, he’d been so angry at Sherlock following his return. He should have realised that, John had always responded badly to what he considered a breach of trust. This seemed to be proved by the fact that John hadn’t had time to spend with Sherlock lately.

“Sherlock?” John was asking, but Sherlock’s mind was too distracted to notice.

Sherlock had never had a best friend, never really had a friend before John. Though he supposed he may have a few more now. Even so, he certainly had never expected to be someone’s best friend. An unexpected feeling of warmth flooded his chest.

Molly hadn’t covered best friends and Sherlock hadn’t thought to ask. Sherlock wondered if his confusing feelings towards John were because he considered John his best friend too. Surely it was appropriate to have more intense feelings if a best friend was more important than a regular friend, such as Molly or Greg, for which he certainly didn’t have such feelings for.

“That’s getting a bit scary now,” he distantly heard John say.

Sherlock’s thoughts turned to the other part of John’s announcement; being John’s best man. He would probably have to make a speech at some point, assist with other wedding type things, (tedious but for John he would do it) and stand next to John at the front of the church (would John want to get married in a church?) and watch as he married Mary.

His heart suddenly felt as though a hand were squeezing it. But that was nonsense; there was nothing wrong with his heart. What was more likely was that the thought of being John’s best man was causing him to have a stress reaction. Completely chemical. Why was the thought of John getting married causing a stress reaction? Weren’t friends supposed to feel happy about such a moment in each other’s lives? If Sherlock could be certain of anything at that moment, he was sure he wasn’t feeling happy.

“Sherlock?” John asked again.

Sherlock finally realised he had been staring at john for a few minutes straight without saying anything. His mind finally decided to latch onto the fact that he was apparently a best friend and temporarily abandoned the rest of it for further investigation.

“So, in fact…” he starts “you, you mean…” he isn’t entirely sure why he’s having such a hard time putting his thoughts into words. He should be pleased about this part at least.

“Yes,” said John, encouraging him to continue.

“I’m your…” he wishes John would just confirm it for him. “best…”

“Man,” John said

And at the same time Sherlock said “Friend?”

“Yeah, ‘course your my best friend,” John confirms.

Sherlock tried to smile at the expectant John. He had wanted to be more involved in John’s life. This should be a good thing.

*****

Sherlock was busy venting out his frustration on his violin. On the one hand John was back to regularly responding to Sherlock’s texts, he never left him waiting more than an hour or two, unless it was in the middle of the night. Sherlock suspected Mary may have taken to putting his phone on silent between the hours of 11pm and 6am. On the other hand John was working again. John had actually seemed apologetic the last time he’d declined a chance at investigating with Sherlock. He’d explained he had a girlfriend (fiancé) to support and a wedding to pay for. He couldn’t afford to take too many days off, or he’d risk losing his job.

What Sherlock had understood was what he was no longer a priority in John’s life.

Sherlock only stopped playing when he heard a knock on his door.

It was Lestrade holding a file in one hand and the other poised to knock again.

“Finally,” he said before eying Sherlock who was only wearing cotton sleep pants and an open dressing gown.

“Mr’s Hudson said you were up early playing, but it looks like you never went to bed. You look half dead,” he said bluntly as he took in Sherlock’s visible ribs and pale face. “Do I need to do another drugs bust?” he walked further into the room.

Sherlock grunted and flopped down into the arm chair. “Idiotic. Of course not. Now what have you got?”

The other day Lestrade had called Sherlock out to an inner city flat where a man had been found dead, most likely poisoned, sitting at his kitchen table. None of the neighbours had heard anything and the door had been locked from the inside.  He had only been discovered after a neighbour noticed a foul smell coming from his flat. Sherlock hadn’t been able to resist the locked room murder, even if John had been in the middle of a 10 hour shift.

The victim had been slouched over the remains of his last meal, a bowel of half eaten porridge. The flat had been otherwise undisturbed. There was no sign of a struggle, no sign of anyone else having been in the flat for days. The man was single and had just started a two week holiday. He had meant to leave on a plane to Scotland that very morning after breakfast.

Sherlock had deduced that the poison had to have been in his food, and that he had eaten it unknowingly. There had been no evidence anyone had been in the flat with him the night before or that morning. Sherlock suspected someone had broken into the flat days before and poisoned the man’s food, and that it had simply taken him this long to consume any of it.

Lestrade had promised to come by when the toxicology results were in as well as other evidence gathered from the crime scene.

“What is it then?” Lestrade asked, refusing to hand over the file.

“I’m fine!” Sherlock moaned.

“No, you look like shit,” Lestrade said bluntly “When did you last eat? If you get any skinnier you’ll be the same weight as you were while on drugs. I didn’t notice it before because of that damn thick coat you always wear.”

“I never eat while on a case, you know that. I just haven’t slept much, it’s nothing to be concerned over,” Sherlock said, but it was obvious Lestrade wasn’t 100% convinced.

“When this case is over, you’re coming over for dinner,” Lestrade continued before Sherlock could complain, “And no arguments. I will set up a drugs bust just to make sure.”

“Fine,” Sherlock grumbled, scowling.

“Fantastic,” Lestrade placed the folder on the table next to Sherlock. “I’ll see you soon.”

He left and Sherlock began flipping through the file.

Ten minutes later Mr’s Hudson came up with some tea and scones.

“I was so glad when Greg told me you’d appreciate a pick me up while you worked. So you just sit and take a break while I tidy up a bit. Only this one time mind, I really am not your housekeeper, buy you’ve certainly let the place go a bit,” she fussed.

“I didn’t say any such thing!” Sherlock exclaimed, while internally cursing the other man.

Why were people all of a sudden so obsessed with bringing him food? This was getting ridiculous. He had survived on his own for two years just fine.

“Have a scone dear,” she said when she saw him looking at the tray as if it had personally offended him. She started cleaning but her eyes kept turning to him.

He sighed and poured himself a cup of tea and picked up one of the scones to nibble on. The bright smile she sent his way was almost worth it.


	12. Mycroft

Once Mr’s Hudson had left Sherlock was able to go through the case files Lestrade had left.

Frank Donnald was the victim’s name. The Yard had interviewed all his friends, family and colleagues. Sherlock was suspended from being present during the interviews after the last time he had made one burst into tears and refuse to testify. He’d heard whispers around the Yard that he was more unstable and more obnoxious than ever now that Watson wasn’t around to temper his naturally abrasive personality. They never said it to his face but Sherlock knew quiet well what they thought of him.

Evidence had also been collected from the scene after Sherlock had left. At Sherlock’s suggestion the forensics team had searched the outside of each window into the flat as well as the roof. As he’d predicted, scratch marks had been found on the outside of the window in the kitchen, indicating someone had forced them open. The only way they could have gotten into that particular window would have been to climb up from ground level, or repel down from the roof. Sherlock had deemed the roof more likely and forensics had found marks around the old chimney stack that were consistent with someone anchoring a climbing rope around it. They had also been able to confirm that the poison had been in the food. It was simply dumb luck that Mr Donnald hadn’t died sooner.

There were currently five suspects that fit the profile Sherlock had for the killer. Two friends , a brother, a cousin and a work colleague. Out of these, three were of the most likely personality type, typically quiet and slightly shy but very intelligent. This crime was thoroughly thought out with research and knowledge of the victim and his habits.

                ‘Robin Winters, Stephan West and Geoffrey Tyler, What are their hobbies? Any interest in adventure sports or knot tying skills? –SH’ he texted to Lestrade

When a reply was not immediately forthcoming he threw his phone onto the arm chair. He was slightly disappointed in how well the evidence fit together. The crime had been clever, well thought out but the execution had been sloppy. An amateur with a good imagination.

With nothing more he could do Sherlock made himself a cup of tea, the pot Mrs Hudson had left had gone cold. He also grabbed another one of the scones and some honey, only to keep Mrs Hudson happy of course.

******

The murderer turned out to be the work mate Geoffery Tyler. He had a long history of being bullied and had been being blackmailed by Frank Donnald. He was also a member of an indoor rock climbing club.

He had made run for it, the idiot, but after a few hours he had been captured. Sherlock found it easy to predict his movements and they were able to corner him in a small laneway.

******

It was 7pm and Sherlock was arriving at Lestrade’s new place. It was smaller than the house he had shared with his wife, but closer to the Yard.

Sherlock pressed the buzzer on the door and waited. Lestrade was quick to open the door.

“Hey come in, I almost expected you wouldn’t turn up,” he said.

“Why wouldn’t I?” Sherlock asked, but as soon as got inside he knew why. “Mycroft is here, that’s his umbrella in the hall stand.”

“Uh yeah, I invited him,” Lestrade sighed, “He kept asking me how you were and I said, if he’s so concerned why doesn’t he come and see for himself, he turned up twenty minutes ago without me even telling him I expected you over.”

Sherlock pushed past his host to find his brother lounging in the sitting room. A bottle of his favourite wine was open on the side table and two glasses recently topped up next to it.

“You’ve made a friend,” Sherlock couldn’t believe it. Mycroft hardly ever showed any interest in anyone other than his brother and people he could manipulate for some reason. Those two often coincided so it would be no great shock that he had been in contact with Lestrade, but no, this time that wasn’t the all of it. Mycroft was more involved than usual.

The look on Mycroft’s face flickered for a moment, showing something he hadn’t seen on his brother since he was a child, and then it was gone again.

“It’s been a beneficial arrangement,” Mycroft conceded.

Behind Sherlock Lestrade snorted, “beneficial arrangement my ass,” he laughed. “You’re worse than Sherlock!”

“Mycroft and I started talking after your er, death,” Lestrade shrugged as he walked forward to grab his wine glass off the table. “He’s not as bad as he likes to think he is.”

Mycroft looked like he didn’t know how to respond to that, and wasn’t that just delightful! So much for the Ice Man.

The front door buzzed again.

“Oh I invited John too, last minute thing, I thought it would be nice to all get together outside of work,” Lestrade said.

“I’m surprised he wasn’t too busy to attend,” was out of Sherlock’s mouth before he realised he’d even thought such a thing.

Lestrade frowned at him before leaving to get the door. Mycroft had raised an eyebrow so Sherlock scowled back at him.

“Good to see you John, you too Mary,” He could hear Lestrade greeting the couple.

Sherlock turned away from his brother and took the few seconds to put together his best grin. Mycroft was certain to see through it, but he was also 98% confident that his brother wouldn’t mention it until they were alone.

John at least seemed genuinely happy to see him.

******

With three sets of eyes taking turns to check up on him Sherlock got through the entire plate of roast pork and vegetables that he had been given. Thankfully his serving size was exactly what he could manage. He was sure he had his brother to thank for that, even though Lestrade had done the cooking.

The table conversation had been kept light, with only a brief discussion of his last case when John enquired.

After dinner the group retired to the sitting room for drinks, or more drinks in some cases. John and Mary had taken up one side of the couch while Sherlock took up the other end next to John. Lestrade had sat in the arm chair near Mary and was engaging her in conversation. Mycroft had disappeared after they’d left the table in order to answer an important work call.

 Sherlock was even feeling slightly more relaxed around John and was genuinely enjoying the tale John had been telling about one of his patients.

Sherlock’s good mood began to dissolve when Mary brought up the wedding. Her conversation with Lestrade had obviously ended and Mycroft had snuck back into the room and was now sitting on Lestrade’s other side.  Mary had leant back into the couch and as a consequence was closer to John, her hand had found his in his lap.

“Sherlock already knows but we wanted to let you know in person that we’ve gotten engaged,” said Mary. She turned to smile at John before looking back to Lestrade and Mycroft.

“You’re both invited to the wedding of course,” John continued.

Lestrade beamed brightly at John and Mary.

“It’s about time!” he laughed. “Everyone’s been wondering why it’s taken so long.”

“Sherlock’s even agreed to be the best man,” continued John, turning to smile warmly at Sherlock.

Sherlock was almost certain his expression was frozen in the smile he had applied earlier. At least he hoped it was.

“No ring yet I see,” commented Mycroft.

“Ah no, spur of the moment kind of thing, after all that’s happened recently. I think we’ll go out together and pick them out,” said John, turning back to Mary. The expression on his face was sickeningly sweet.

“It’ll be nice. Anyway, it will probably be for the best that I get to have a say, this one is hopeless,” Mary joked.

“I’m not that bad!” John objected.

“Oh you mean well dear, but you don’t always get it right. Remember last Christmas?”

“Oh I remember that!” Lestrade laughed.

John’s face was going red, “I thought we weren’t bringing that up again?”

Sherlock had no idea what they were talking about and it was extremely grating. Sherlock knew John could be a hit or miss gift giver, but it was innocent comments like that one that were making him all the more aware of how much he had missed out on in the last two years. Sherlock could only remember last Christmas as a thing that had passed him by without notice. Christmas had never been a big thing for Sherlock, for years he hadn’t cared, hadn’t celebrated. But then John came along with his love of tradition and festive cheer.  Last Christmas Sherlock had taken the time to imagine the flat as festively decorated by John and had wished he were there instead of several thousand kilometres away. Would John still want to celebrate Christmas at 221B with him? He would probably be decorating his new flat with Mary this year.

Suddenly John and Mary were standing and Sherlock realised they were about to leave and that he had zoned out of the conversation. They said their goodbyes and Sherlock was all set to follow them out when Mycroft asked to have a private word.

“This had better be important,” he moaned as Mycroft lead Sherlock into Lestrade’s bathroom and closed the door.

“You love him,” Mycroft said it as a statement of fact.

“I don’t…” Sherlock started, taken aback.

“You haven’t fully realised have you? You’re in love with John,” Mycroft looked concerned.

“What? That’s absurd,” he couldn’t be in love with John.  John was his best friend, yes, but he certainly wasn’t attracted to him, wasn’t in love with him. Was he?

“I can see it in the way you look at him, in the way you react when John shows affection for Mary, the look on your face when they brought up their engagement. I’m sorry for putting you in this situation tonight Sherlock. Gregory had noticed that you hadn’t seen much of John lately and thought you could use some time around friendly company. We were both certain your current upset was due to a lack of acceptance on John’s part. I’m ashamed to say this scenario never occurred to me. You’ve never shown romantic interest in anyone before,” Mycroft actually sounded apologetic. Mycroft never sounded apologetic.

Sherlock searched his brother’s face. There was no hint of deceit. He believed what he was saying; he had looked at all of the evidence presented to him by Sherlock and come up with the most likely conclusion. How could he loving John Watson be the most likely conclusion? Sherlock hated to admit it, but Mycroft was hardly ever wrong, in fact his brother often liked to brag that he was the smarter of the two. Sherlock would never confirm that to his face, but he did know that their skills were near on par with each other.

“Grief and hindsight do much to change a person, to alter a perspective,” said Mycroft.

Sherlock had forgotten what it was like to be around someone as observant as himself. It was horrible.

There was a knock at the door.

“Everything all right in there?” Lestrade called through the door, “Only, I’ll be wanting my loo back soon.”

Sherlock took that opening to depart. He barely said goodbye to Lestrade before rushing out the front door.

He needed time to think.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for skipping a week :( This chapter has been hard to get out and I'm still not 100% happy with it but it's as good as it's going to get. I'll try and have something ready for next week, though it probably won't be as long as this chapter.


	13. Thoughts

Mrs Hudson was under the impression that marriage could change a person. Sherlock thought that was rather absurd. When it came to a couple who were already cohabitating, signing a marriage certificate, having a party and going on a holiday should make no difference to their lives.

What could change was how a person prioritised their time due to the associated importance of their spouse and the concept of family. Marriage was also associated with settling down; it opened up the social expectation of children. Children could change a person more than marriage in itself could. Children meant no spare time; especially for John who Sherlock was certain would want to be an involved father.  Children added a financial strain to the parents, which in turn meant more hours at work, or at least more dedication to work. There could be no running out on a shift or leaving early or taking days off at the last minute.  Family before friends, before crime solving.

Less time for Sherlock.

John was a loyal friend and initially he’d put in the effort to see Sherlock and stay a part of his life but realistically Sherlock knew that couldn’t last forever. Eventually they would only see each other a few times a year, if he were lucky.

 Was he in love with John?

He had jumped off the roof of St Barts for John (even if it hadn’t been fatal), because John was the most important person in Sherlock’s life and he had only realised it too late. Then he had spent the last few years destroying Moriarty’s web, making sure his friends were safe, so that John was safe.

Two lonely and exhausting years with a lot of time to think, think and come to realise how much he missed him.

How much he loved him?

********

In an effort to make sense of his feelings Sherlock found himself searching online for results about being in love romantically with someone without wanting to have sex with them.

He found a list of pages about asexuality and romantic orientations. How could there be a part of the human experience that he had never considered before?

Had his brother heard of asexuality? Did he consider that as an option for Sherlock? Could that be what the Woman had picked up on but had confused with his sexual inexperience?

Had he confused it with his sexual inexperience?

It was true that he had never had sexual attraction for anyone and that certainly wasn’t different for John. The thought of sex with John was just as unappealing as any other time he had contemplated it, of that he was certain. It was also true when Mycroft said he had never had any inclination towards romantic relationships. He usually thought the whole concept absurd. But perhaps with John….

Demi-romantic asexual perhapse? The definitions fit better than anything else he had heard of before.

After hours of research into the subject he deleted all of his search history and snapped his laptop closed.

Later that night he received a message from Mycroft.

                ‘Don’t lose hope- MH’

The meddling fool.

********

Sherlock awoke gasping for breath and with phantom pains tingling along his back. The flesh had healed but it seemed his experiences while away had not only left scars on his back but also in his mind.

The flat was too quiet. It was almost like he could feel the emptiness of the rooms around him. Every time he went to bed he would wake from nightmares. His nightmares and avoidance were leading to moments of complete exhaustion where his body would simply give up and he would often sleep for short periods on the couch or at his desk. It had been going on ever since he arrived home but had really caught up to him now.

He got out of bed. It was useless to stay, he was never able to go back to sleep. Instead he went out to sit in front of the TV. The volume was on low but the low mummer of voices made him feel more at ease. He put a nicotine patch on each arm, but half an hour later added two more. It really was hard not smoking.  It was really had not giving in to more.

Charles Augustus Magnussen was due back in the country in a few weeks.  It would be the perfect time to come up with a plan to make Magnussen underestimate him. He knew how Magnussen worked, picking out everyone’s weaknesses, their pressure points as he called them. Sherlock needed him to think him not a threat in order to get the letters back for lady Smallwood.

He found he was absentmindedly scratching the inside of his left elbow. He had been doing that more often lately. The call of his old addiction had been strong while he had been away, especially when he had been trying to bring down a drug ring that had been financing a sector or Moriarty’s crime ring.  But he had resisted because he knew if he gave in he would likely fail, slip up and the chances of him getting home (to John) would be slim. That and he knew John wouldn’t approve.

A drug addiction would certainly be a worthy pressure point to make Magnussen underestimate him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Seasons Greeting everyone! And Merry Christmas for next week to all who celebrate :) There won't be an update next week but I'll try and put up one more chapter before the end of the year. You can probably tell that things aren't happening the same or on the same timeline as season 3. It should be getting interesting pretty soon ;)


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy New Year everyone! :D I'm a bit late but you get a new chapter for the first day of they year!

The first crime scene after the diner party Sherlock could feel Lestrade’s eyes on him.

Sherlock knew he wasn’t looking his best. He had been plagued with insomnia and nightmares when he did try to sleep. It didn’t help that his old addiction had been on his mind more and more lately, made worse by the fact that it would actually help in his case against Magnussen. The draw was getting stronger and his interaction with John had been restricted to infrequent text messages due to the other man’s schedule.

Lestrade didn’t say anything that day and Sherlock was both grateful and slightly disappointed.

He solved the case easily and a few days of nothing followed. All his emails held nothing but trivial problems easily solved if the people could be bothered to think even a little. He deleted them all and slammed his laptop shut.

*******

Mrs Hudson had continued to pop into the flat to tidy and place ready-made meals in Sherlock’s fridge. She was being too nice and Sherlock both hated and admired her for it.

******

It had been almost a week since his last case and Sherlock was languishing on the couch after another sleepless night. His brain was aching with boredom when he finally jumped off the couch and picked up his violin.

He began angrily dragging the bow over the strings while staring out the window at the rain soaked street. His arms were already covered with multiple nicotine patches but they just weren’t enough anymore. It hadn’t even been this bad while he had been away because there had nearly always been something to plan, something to do. Now he was relying on the criminal classes of London or his private clients to give him an interesting puzzle to solve, or waiting for John to have enough time to spend with him.

Eventually the screeching turned into proper music as he tried to lose himself in the process of playing, to get his mind to still if even for a short time.

 

“Yoo, hoo.  Sherlock,” came Mrs Hudson’s voice minutes or hours later and accompanied by a light knock.

 

“I’m not in the mood for tea Mrs Hudson,” he said without turning around.

 

“Glad I’m not here for tea then,” came Lestrade’s voice from the doorway.

 

Sherlock turned around, bow still raised.

 

“Lestrade, a case?”

 

“Not quite, but I thought I would bring by a few cold cases,” he said, waving a handful files.

 

“You’ve been talking to Mycroft,” Sherlock frowned.

 

 "Yeah I have. Are you going to refuse to look at the cases out of spite?" he asked.

 

Mycroft was actually concerned about him. Enough to talk to someone else about it, which said a lot about both his relationship with Lestrade, but also how bad he thought Sherlock’s situation, was.

 

"No, I'll take them," Sherlock held out his hand, but Lestrade still held the files back.

 

"Not until you shower. I can smell you from here,"

 

Unfortunately Sherlock felt this was probably true, he hadn’t needed to leave the flat in a few days and as such he had remained in his pyjamas the whole time.

 

"Fine," he growled.

 

He put away his violin and stomped his way to the bathroom. He had just turned on the taps in the shower when he heard Lestrade’s voice carrying from the sitting room. It was only one side of a conversation, a phone call then.

 

"I think you were right."

 

"He doesn't look good. I would have thought drugs, but-"

 

"Yeah."

 

Mycroft, it had to be him on the other side of the call.

 

"He was playing sad music and his eyes were red. It looked like he had been crying."

 

Sherlock turned sharply to look at his reflection in the mirror. His own red rimmed eyes stared sadly back at him. There were even wet tracks down his cheeks. How had he been crying and not even noticed? He hadn’t properly cried since, well he wasn’t going to think about that now.

 

Sherlock quickly shed his clothes and stood under the showers spray. He tilted his face upwards with eyes closed and let the water flow over his face for a few moments. Now the water was falling all around him it was muffling the sound from the other room. He didn't want to hear any more of what Lestrade was saying anyway.

 

Mycroft was concerned, which meant he would meddle. Hopefully it only went as far as involving Lestrade whom, for some inexplicable reason, he was on friendly terms with. As long as he didn't directly involve John. Sherlock didn't think he would, but his brother had a history of trying to protect or help Sherlock in a not so helpful way.

 

He finished off his shower and went through to his room to pick out some clean clothes. There were only a few clean shirts left in his draw. He hadn't done any washing in a long while. John had used to remind him, or take it down with his own basket and sometimes dropped the dry cleaning off on his way to work.

 

Dressing quickly in black trousers and blue button up shirt, Sherlock left the room and the problem of his dirty washing behind. Lestrade was sitting on the couch with the case files beside him. Sherlock sat next to him and picked them up.

 

"Only one is one of ours from when you were away. The other two are from other stations, out in the country, both thefts but quite interesting. I pulled some favours and let the detectives in charge know you may be in touch," Lestrade explained as Sherlock flipped through the pages.

 

“Look, Sherlock you know I’m your friend and you can talk to me about anything,” Lestrade said after a few moments of silence.

 

Sherlock grunted but didn’t look up from the page he was reading.

 

“I’m serious, if you’re ah, having troubles or you know, feeling down you can talk to me. I’ve noticed you haven’t been right lately,” Lestrade said awkwardly.

 

Sherlock paused and looked up from his reading. “I thank you for the sentiment but I’m almost certain there’s nothing you could help me with,” he said.

 

“Well alright then, just wanted you to know the offers always open,” said Lestrade before standing. “I had better get back to work. I hope they prove somewhat of a challenge for you,” he nodded to the papers.

 

“I doubt they will, but thank you,” he said, quite sincere in his thanks.

 

Lestrade smiled warmly at him before he left and Sherlock momentarily wondered how he had missed the value in his relationship with the detective for so many years.


	15. Found out

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things are coming together now!
> 
>  **A warning for drug use this chapter. ******
> 
> It happens in the second section, after the first lot of ********** Its only short so you can skip it if you like and not really miss anything important. Then it's talked about about again, in the second last section.

When he was introduced to Mary’s best friend and maid of honour, Sherlock had been bracing himself for a tedious session of wedding planning that usually sent dread filling his chest. He put up with the planning because apparently being best man meant John was now paying him more attention again. It was both fantastic and terrible because at the same time that he got to spend more time with John, it was also mostly in the presence of Mary and the evidence of their happy relationship.

Being aware of his own feelings now almost made it worse because it was like watching his ideal life slipping further away with each wedding detail that was being ticked off the list.

When he found out maid of honour, Janine was working as Magnussen’s personal assistant; well a plan began to take shape in his mind.  Part of Sherlock couldn’t help but hope that his plan would make John take notice of him for other reasons (possibility of jealousy?) well that would only be a bonus.

**********

The plunger had been depressed and he didn’t have much time to think about the consequences of his actions before the chemicals were flooding his system and making him feel so much better. Here he was temporarily away from disappointment and the hurt and the expectations. Part of him knew this wasn’t a solution to his problems that this was merely like one of those sticky bandages that would hurt terribly when it was ripped away; temporary and only hiding the real problem beneath.

He had friends now, people to disappoint. John would be so disappointed. But would he be around enough to even notice before it was all over?

Sherlock was sure it would all be over soon. This was for the case, he reminded himself, and if it happened to give him a reprieve from his runaway emotions well all the better. But it was just for the case. He couldn’t become dependent again, he couldn’t.

Magnussen was a shark waiting for his next meal and Sherlock was adding blood to the water while waiting with his trap.

It was just for the case.

*********

Janine liked him, thought he was interesting and charming.

Sherlock had never really realised how absurd kissing was, it was wet and not particularly enjoyable but Janine seemed to be take pleasure in it, which was all that mattered at the moment.

She thought their relationship was going quite well.

Sherlock hoped he could complete his plan sooner rather than later. Though his relationship with Janine was having one positive side effect he hadn’t quite anticipated. Due to her increasing presence in his life he had been making sure to take better care of his body. Mrs Hudson had been pestering him less and Lestrade wasn’t looking quite as worried every time he saw him, so that was a plus.

 

*******

“There’s lipstick on the back of your neck,” Lestrade blurted out while Sherlock was crouched on the ground observing the blood spatter on the concrete.

“Mmm, oh must have missed that,” Sherlock said, while bringing his arm around to wipe at the back of his neck.

“Why did you have lipstick on the back of your neck?” Lestrade asked still perplexed.

Sherlock stood and turned to him, “I’m seeing someone, she likes to kiss a lot,” he shrugged. “You know how women are.”

“You’re what? Sherlock are you ok?” Lestrade sounded concerned.

“Meeting new people is positive isn’t it? I thought you’d be happy,” Sherlock asked as he moved to examine the wall of the alleyway they were in. There was enough blood here to for a fatal wound, but there had been no body found to match it. There weren’t even any drip marks to show a person staggering away to collapse somewhere else.

“You’re not attracted to women; I’ve known that for years. And what about John?” Lestrade said quietly.

“What about him?” Sherlock said, purposefully avoiding the real question.

“You know what I mean Sherlock,” Lestrade pressed.

Sherlock turned to look Lestrade in the eye, “He’s getting married in a few months. And besides, romantic orientation is completely different from sexual attraction.”

“Romantic orientation? You’re trying to tell me you’re romantically interested in this woman then?”

“What I can tell you is that when you test this blood you’ll likely find it’s been in cold storage. There’s a set of footsteps leading to the curb but there’s only one. There’s no evidence of a second person here at all. No sign of a struggle besides the scattering of rubbish which is completely wrong for the blood spatter. So either the victim walked away from this and got in a car all on their own, near impossible with this amount of blood loss, or they staged it to look like they’d been fatally injured. I think you’ll find this is another fake murder and the victim is alive and well, possibly on a flight out of the country by now,” Sherlock explained.

Lestrade swore and whipped out his phone as he walked a bit away to make a call.

By the time he was finished Sherlock was gone.

**********

John found him by accident.

Sherlock had been keeping up with their regular correspondence. He hadn’t wanted John to think anything was wrong or he would pry. No, his hits had been timed specifically to avoid dependence and detection, not only from John but also Janine who was taking up more of Sherlock’s time lately. He also couldn’t be around Lestrade while high or he would lose his access to crime scenes for sure. Lestrade would also be disappointed and maybe even angry, which Sherlock thought may be even worse. Damn his own sentiment.

So even though he was going to great lengths to hide his case work (drug use) from his friends, he was still disappointed at having been almost literally stumbled upon by John who was looking for a neighbours child. John armed with a tyre lever and all his stupid bravery and fierce protectiveness had entered a drug den to find and bring home his neighbours foolish child. Sherlock had been unexpected and worse, he had once again been on the receiving end of John’s anger and disappointment.

He had lashed out and tried to convince John that it was only undercover work for a case, (because he was,  he was and John just didn’t understand how important it was) But John seemed to think that was a lie, such a weak excuse. He was furious.

(Had he lied to himself too?) Of course it was for the case. Why couldn’t John or anyone else see?

**********

Molly had slapped him, but it was the look on her face that hurt more.

They weren’t supposed to find out. He supposed this was the high price of having friends; you had the potential of offending them, disappointing them, (hurting them). Worse, he could no longer imagine life without them. The two years had been long enough.

In the end he was forced to promise not to use again. He could only hope that the evidence of his “returned addiction” would be obvious enough to Magnussen when he meets with him later in the day.

He would only be in London for one night so everything had to go according to plan.


	16. Meddling Mycroft

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter explores a scene from HLV so a lot of the dialogue is borrowed from there if it seems familiar ;) Though the scene doesn't happen in exactly the same way and you get to know what Sherlock is thinking this time round :P This chapter was necessary to keep the plot on track, it will be branching back away from the episode again soon though. Hope you enjoy.

He was in a car again. John was too. Perhaps he should let John in on the case. He may not be so angry then. So he started to tell John about Magnussen but suddenly realised all the other people were gone. Hadn’t there been more people? Had they left them behind? He must have been filtering the conversation again and not noticed when they’d left.  Apparently John thinks this is very ‘not good’. Sherlock can tell from his tone of voice and the look on his face.

Sherlock is now very good at spotting John’s ‘not good’ face.

When they arrived at 221B Sherlock noticed the angle of the knocker and instantly knew Mycroft was waiting inside. Trust his brother to let his OCD show. Sherlock pushed it back to an angle, there that was better.

Inside Mycroft  was sitting on the stairs and he actually has the gall to look concerned before he hid it behind the insults. Sherlock can see past the harsh words however. Mycroft is concerned and so is meddling, just what Sherlock was trying to avoid.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

“I phoned him,” John said before Mycroft could answer.

Sherlock is so unused to having so many people concerned about him. It’s slightly irritating even if it does make him feel oddly warm inside.

When Mycroft simply stares with that all knowing look on his face he turns to John.

“You phoned him,” it comes out more as an accusation than a question. If Sherlock had been in a better frame of mind he would have been extremely irritated that he had repeated John’s words back to him, something he usually hated being done to him.

“Course I bloody called him,” John scowls at him.

“Course he bloody did,” Mycroft said mockingly. “Now, save me a little time. Where should we be looking?”

“We?” Sherlock asked. He hadn’t expected Mycroft to have involved anyone else. He wouldn’t have contacted their parents and Sherlock couldn’t think of who else he could have asked to help.

“Mr Holmes?” that voice was irritatingly familiar. He couldn’t have. Anderson?

“For God’s sake!” he exclaimed before rushing up the stairs.

There he finds Anderson and a few others searching through his things in the kitchen, and making a bloody big mess of everything too Sherlock imagined.

“I’m sorry Sherlock, It’s for your own good,” Anderson actually looks apologetic. Since when had Anderson looked at him like that? What had happened to the sneering, bitter man who had enjoyed taunting Sherlock at crime scenes? Why had Mycroft thought such a person was suitable to call in to snoop around his flat?

Feeling completely horrid Sherlock pulled the hood of his jumper down over his head and went to curl up in his arm chair. He sincerely wished everyone would just vanish while his eyes were closed, well maybe not John.

“Some members of your little fan club. They’re entirely trustworthy,” Mycroft is still there when he opens his eyes, and still watching him with that damn piercing gaze and what seems to be pity more so than disappointment. Sherlock’s not sure if that’s worse.

Wait, he had a fan club? A fan club that Anderson was a part of? What had happened in the two year’s he’d been away? Everyone had gone mad!

“You can’t afford a drug habit Sherlock,” his brother continues, bringing him out of his thoughts.

Sherlock hardly though you could call a few carefully calculated weeks a habit. He was fully capable of quitting when his case was over.

“What happened to my chair?” John asked suddenly. He was looking suspiciously at the space where it used to be.

“You were gone, I saw no use for it and it was taking up valuable space. It was also blocking my view of the kitchen,” Sherlock said, definitely with more bitterness than he intended. Trust John to notice something was wrong only when he was presented with something as physically obvious as a missing chair.

In fact, he had moved it a week ago in a fit of melancholy. Just seeing it there, empty and knowing it would likely remain that way now that John was getting married had just been too much to bare.  He hadn’t been able to stand such a physical reminder every day so he’d moved it upstairs to John’s (old) room. Out of sight out of mind, wasn’t that a thing people said? It hadn’t completely worked.

John turned to Mycroft, “Well, it’s good to me missed,”

Once again John was looking but not seeing. Wasn’t it obvious how much Sherlock missed him?

“You were gone,” he repeated, “I saw an opportunity,” he said moodily. Lying was so much so much easier than letting his feelings be known.

“No, you saw the kitchen,” said John.

He just wished John was better at picking up his lies and seeing what was hidden underneath. He used to be better at it, Sherlock was sure.

Mycroft turned towards Anderson, “What have you found so far? Clearly nothing.”

“There’s nothing to find,” Sherlock said. Why would he keep anything here? Especially not with Janine over so often lately. He certainly didn’t want her to know what he was up to or she would leave before the case was done.

Janine, oh.

“Your bedroom door is shut. You haven’t been home all night, something to hide brother?”

Of course she would still be in there; she didn’t start work until 9. He knew Janine’s work schedule as well as he knew Johns.

Mycroft started heading towards the bedroom door. He was sure Mycroft knew about Janine, probably through his buddy Lestrade. He was in two minds about letting John know. Either way he doesn’t want her involved in this conversation. It’s all a delicate balancing act that was getting harder to maintain.

“Okay stop! Just stop,” Sherlock gave in, it’s the only thing he can do right now. “You’ve made your point.”

“Jesus Sherlock,” John said.

Sherlock can no longer look John in the eye.

“I will have to call our parents. I hadn’t wanted to interrupt their line-dancing, but perhaps it will do you some good,” Mycroft is looking at him with pity, like he’s some sort of tragic case. The look is only noticeable to Sherlock of course, for which he is somewhat glad.

“Please don’t,” the last thing he wants is his parents involved, especially when all this should be all over within the next few days. They would mean well but they wouldn’t look further than anything Mycroft told them and he wouldn’t be able to get anything done. “It’s not what you think. It’s for a case.”

(Yes of course that’s the only reason)

“What case could possibly justify this?” Mycroft sounds exasperated. At least Sherlock now knows his brother hadn’t been spying as closely as he had though.

Sherlock sighed and got up out of the chair. He hadn’t wanted to reveal this all to Mycroft but he knew his brother would be unbearable in his middling unless he had a reason big enough for him to bugger off and leave Sherlock to his work.

“Magnussen,” he said. Of course he only needed to reveal just enough to drive his brother off. “Charles Augustus Magnussen,”

Mycroft breathed in sharply and turned to the search team. He tells them to get out and threatens them if they reveal to anyone what they heard about Magnussen. When they’ve gone he turns to John.

“I hope I won’t have to threaten you too,” he said.

“Well I think we’d both find that embarrassing,” said John.

So now something interesting was happening John was interested and defensive, Sherlock though bitterly.

“Magnussen is not your business,” Mycroft said stiffly.

“So he’s yours?” Sherlock countered.

“You may consider him under my protection,” Mycroft said.

Sherlock raised his eyebrows. If Mycroft was involved in some way with Magnussen, perhaps this would be more interesting than he had first thought. There had to be a good reason why Mycroft and his people had yet to deal with such a despicable being as Magnussen. “I’ll consider you under his thumb,” he said.

“If you go against Magnussen, then you will find yourself going against me.”

“Okay I’ll let you know if I notice,” Sherlock said. He walked over to the door and opened it, gesturing for Mycroft to leave. “Now if you don’t mind.”

“This venture is quite unwise brother, especially with er,” Mycroft looked subtly towards John.

Sherlock scowled. “That’s got nothing to do with anything,” he said angrily, pushing forward and pinning Mycroft against the wall.

Part of him knew he was only fuelling the fire of Mycroft’s concern, but he was too angry that he would bring that up in front of John, no matter if John was unlikely to catch on.

“Magnussen may make it an issue if you’re not careful,” Mycroft warned.

Sherlock shoved him again.

“Mycroft,” John said while placing a hand on Sherlock’s back.

Suddenly that’s all Sherlock could feel, that hand print pressed firmly between his shoulder blades. He leant back onto it, coincidently giving Mycroft enough room to slip free. It felt as though all his nerve endings were suddenly concentrated on that one spot. A shiver went down his back as the hand was removed and he felt its loss more keenly than he would have ever anticipated.

“I think you should leave,” John pressed.

A ruffled Mycroft straightened his jacket and looked between John and Sherlock.

“Be careful Sherlock,” he said finally before he turned to leave.


	17. Sherlock and Janine?

Janine had been easy to charm. She was of above average intelligence but still insisted in conforming to societies standards and was happy with a dull repetitive existence.  She was also aesthetically pleasing to look at.  If Sherlock had to be seen out with a woman he supposed she was a better option than most. He also took the time they spent together to observe her, her mannerisms, movements. It had been a long time since Sherlock had spent so much time around a woman, not counting Mr’s Hudson, the last being Miss Adler though he hadn’t spent as much time physically in her presence. Janine was at least an interesting observational study.

The only thing he was having trouble putting up with was the touching. Most of the time it wasn’t so unpleasant, just casual touches of her hands against his hands, arms, back, hair, she particularly liked his hair. Sherlock found he could possibly enjoy the touching of the hair if, well the touching wasn’t done by Janine. She kept putting him off with her small soft hands. These touches had taken some getting used to as people generally didn’t touch him. He’d gotten used to Mr’s Hudson and her hugs and her fussing. He’d even gotten used to John’s rare pats on the back or shoulder, but as a general rule John wasn’t very physical with his male friends unless it involved some kind of contact sport, which Sherlock thought not to count.

Sherlock had shocked himself by one night while sitting on the couch with Janine in her flat. They had been watching some inane movie that was supposed to be romantic but Sherlock thought was entirely dull and predictable, when she’d began petting his hair,  sending pleasant tingles across his scalp and he’d momentarily wondered what it would feel like if it were John’s larger and rougher hands instead. He imagined he may quite like that, but didn’t have the time to think on it further.

He’d managed to keep them from actually having sex. Janine seemed quite happy with the touching and the kissing, though the touching kept getting more adventurous as the relationship progressed. He’d even had to sleep next to her in bed. Sleep had not come to Sherlock that night, or any other night they shared a bed. This was partially from the unfamiliar sensation of having someone else in his bed but also because he was still prone to terrible nightmares and he didn’t want to wake her in his distress.

*******

After Mycroft had left the flat he knew Janine couldn’t stay hidden away forever. If she stayed in bed any longer she would be late for work, which wouldn’t be good for anyone.

As he closed himself away in the bathroom, Sherlock couldn’t help but wonder what John would make of Janine and their relationship.

He filled the bath this time, and sighed as his muscles relaxed in the hot water. This was just what he needed right now.

He heard the door to the bedroom open as Janine entered the kitchen. Sherlock wondered at the look on John’s face. He sounded shocked when he greeted her a few seconds later and Sherlock could picture the look of disbelief on his face. He chuckled when Janine calls his brother Mike. Mycroft hated it when their mother called him that and it had been fun to make Janine believe that’s what he preferred, even if he had to put up with being called Sherl. It was a slight step up from Shezza at least. Personally Sherlock had never seen a reason to shorten someone’s name or give them a nickname. If they had a preferred name the usually let him know. He had chosen to go by Sherlock after all.

Hearing the door knob to the bathroom turn he realised Janine was coming in, just when he had been revelling in his alone time.

He produced a smile just before she fully emerged from the doorway.

“Morning! Room for a little one?” she asked.

He nods, laughing, fully in character of playful boyfriend. It’s a good thing he’s such a good actor, though it does get tiring sometimes.

*******

John has a bemused smile on his face. Sherlock wonders what he finds harder to believe. That he’s dating Janine, that he’s dating a woman or that Sherlock is dating anyone at all. It’s probably a combination of all three. He did tell John that girlfriends weren’t his area. At the time John had took that to mean he was gay. Sherlock had never really cared what anyone thought of his sexuality, since he hadn’t though much of it himself. It had never interfered with his work and that was the way he liked it. Though perhaps the statement that he was married to his work had given John the impression he had chosen celibacy in order to not be distracted. Either way, it hadn’t mattered at the time.  Now though Sherlock feels the need to prove to John that he is indeed capable of affection at least.

“You’ve probably got some questions,” Sherlock opened

“You have a girlfriend?” it’s the obvious question that Sherlock was expecting. John kept looking between Sherlock and Janine with an odd smile on his face they both watched her as she disappeared into the bedroom.

“Yes I have,” he confirmed, successfully sounding happy about it too.

“Yes you have,” John parroted back. He seemed to be in much more shock than Sherlock had anticipated.

“Yes,” Sherlock said slowly, “I’m going out with Janine; I thought that was fairly obvious.”

“Yes well, yes,” John cleared his throat. “But I mean, you, you are in in a relationship.”

Sherlock blinked at him. Is it truly that hard for John to picture him in a relationship? “Yes I am,”

“You and Janine?”

“Yes,” Sherlock sighed.

“Since when?” John asked. Finally another question!

“Just over two months I think,” Sherlock smiled and shrugged.

“And how’s that been going for you?” asked John, he still looked bemused.

“I think we are in a good place, it’s quite affirming actually,” Sherlock said.

“You got that from a book,” John sounded quite amused by that. He seemed to think Sherlock had been researching relationships to make Janine happy. He’s not wrong, though it hadn’t been entirely for Janine’s benefit. John is happy for him and his relationship, that is slightly unexpected.

“Everyone got that from a book,”

Janine re-entered the room at that moment and they pause their conversation as she came to sit on the arm of Sherlock’s chair.

“Okay, you two bad boys, behave yourselves,” She said. Sherlock Smiled at her and wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

“And you Sherl, you’re gunna have to tell me where you were last night,” she turned to John. “Disappeared out of bed this one did,” she whacked Sherlock lightly on his arm.

“Sorry, I was working,” Sherlock leaned in to kiss her on the cheek. “Got a message late and didn’t want to wake you.”

“Such a sweet heart this one,” she said to John before leaning down to kiss Sherlock on the tip of his nose. Leaning back she turned once again to John. “I haven’t told Mary about this, I kind of wanted to surprise her.”

“Yeah, you probably will,” John was still watching them with an odd smile on his face.

“But we should have you two over for a dinner really soon,” she suggested.

“Yeah!” Sherlock tried his best to sound genuinely excited by that idea, though honestly it sounds like a disaster.

“My place though, not the cuzz dump!,” she knocked Sherlock’s arm again, before laughing. Sherlock quickly joined her. Was that supposed to be one of those couple in jokes?

“Great, yeah. Dinner Yeah,” John didn’t seem to know what to do with this invitation. It seemed he was still in shock over the whole situation; his voice was even a few octaves higher than usual.

Janine moved away from Sherlock’s arm and stood. “Oh I’d better dash, it was brilliant to see you,”

John stood, “you too.”

Sherlock got up to show Janine out, opening the door and holding it open for her.

“Have a lovely day. Call me later,” he said.

She turned and begun to fiddle with the lapel of his jacket. She smiled teasingly up at him.

“I might do, I might call you, unless I meet someone prettier,” she leaned in to kiss him.

 He followed her in and pressed their lips together. He had this perfected to an art by now. This one was a goodbye kiss in front of company so he kept it short and sweet.

Janine pulled back slightly and whispered “Solve me a crime Sherlock Holmes,” before moving forward just enough so that their noses touched.

For Sherlock this act was more pleasurable and much more intimate than the kiss was, then they ever are form him. He felt his cheeks flush slightly. He prefers this type of closeness. And sincerely hopes to get to experience it properly, with someone he actually cares for, if they’ll let him.

Janine leaned back and gave Sherlock one last smile before leaving the flat.

John cleared his throat. “So, uh, how did that happen?” he indicates to the area that Janine had just occupied.

“I think you should know the mechanisms of a kiss John. I rather though you were quite the expert.” He said while closing the door.

“What?” John startled, “No, no. I mean how did you two get together. As far as I was aware you had only met a few times during out wedding planning.”

“Ah,” Sherlock said as sat back down in his armchair. John sat back on the couch.

“I wanted someone to help me test out the waltz I’m writing for your wedding. She’s quite good actually and thought my composing romantic. We danced,” he shrugged.

“You dance?” John asked.

“Yes, it’s something I quite enjoy. I had lessons as a child and I’m actually quite good at it,” Sherlock admitted.

“Ah, well.” John paused. Sherlock had clearly thrown him. “I didn’t even know you knew how to dance.”

Sherlock shrugged again, “There’s not much cause for dancing in crime fighting, but I live in hope for the right case.”

“Right, seems there’s a lot I don’t know about you.”

“You never asked,” Sherlock said.

“Well I suppose not,” John said thoughtfully.

The room is quiet for a few moments. “So me and Mary coming for dinner, with wine and sitting. That’s a thing now. I thought we’d pulled off a miracle just having you round to ours.”

Sherlock stared at him. “You’re still in shock?”

“It’ll just take a little getting used to. You in a relationship, doing couple things!” John sounds amazed and laughed.

“Is it so hard to imagine?” Sherlock asked. He was a little hurt if her were honest. He had expected some level of disbelief but this was just ridiculous.

“Well not any more after what I just saw,” John teased.

Sherlock scowled at him.


	18. CAM

John cleared his throat loudly “So, this Magnussen bloke, he owns some newspapers yeah? That’s who you were talking about before right?” John asked.

“Yes,” Sherlock was glad for the change in topic. “That’s just his public persona though. He’s much more than that. Have you ever been to the shark tank at the aquarium John? Stood up close to the glass? Those floating flat faces, those dead eyes. That’s what he is. I’ve dealt with murders, psychopaths, terrorists, serial killers. None of them can turn my stomach like Charles Augustus Magnussen,” Sherlock moved from the arm chair to the desk by the window and opened his laptop.

“I’m not exaggerating when I say that he knows the critical pressure point of every person of note or influence in the whole of the Western world, and probably beyond. He’s the Napoleon of blackmail.”

Sherlock opened up a photo of Magnussen’s house complete with a blueprint of the premises and turned the screen so that John could see. John has his listening face on, the one Sherlock only sees on cases when John knows the details are important. He hasn’t seen it for much too long.

“This is much more than his home, it is an unassailable architecture of forbidden knowledge. Its name is Appledore, and it’s the greatest repository of sensitive and dangerous information anywhere in the world. None of it is on computer, he’s smart, computers can be hacked. It’s all on hard copy in vauts under that house,” he pointed to the area on the blueprint. “As long as the information is in there, the personal freedom of everyone you’ve ever met is a fantasy.”

Suddenly there’s a knock at the door. Both Sherlock and John turn to see Mrs Hudson standing in the doorway, looking distinctly unsettled.

“Didn’t you hear it? The doorbell rang,” she said, sounding agitated.

“It kept ringing so I put it in the fridge,” Sherlock said.

How was he supposed to concentrate with that annoying sound going off at random intervals? He’d preferred it when clients and visitors had to knock and Mrs Hudson was able to screen if they were important or not and let them up. Or better yet, when John had still lived in the flat he had usually heard the knock when Sherlock hadn’t, and had often gone down on his own to see who was there.

Mrs Hudson had installed the doorbell and informed Sherlock that she wasn’t going to be around all the time to let people in. She was his land lady, not a cleaner or a butler.

“Oh, that’s not a fault Sherlock,” she said.

Humm, she was more distressed than usual and Sherlock knew who was at the door before John could ask, before the man even walked in the door. Charles Augustus Magnussen.

Of course he should have expected the man to show up here even after making an appointment at his office. The man ever loved to intimidate, to put people in uncomfortable and unexpected positions. Ever the predator, he always needed to be in control, and he had the influence and money to do so.

It started with the three security men who enter first and dominate the space, checking Sherlock and John for weapons in Sherlock’s own home. Sherlock keeps an eye on Magnussen, reading him as much as he’s sure Magnussen is reading Sherlock and John.

“Mr Magnussen, I have been asked to intercede with you by Lady Elizabeth Smallwood on the matter of her husband’s letters. Some time ago you, put pressure on her concerning those letters,” started Sherlock.

It appears that Magnussen is not paying him any attention. He’s certainly putting on a great act. John certainly seems to believe it, but Sherlock is aware that it is simply another intimidation tactic. As much as he hates being ignored he continues. He has an act to keep up too.

“She would like those letters back. Obviously the letters no longer have any practical use to you, so with that in mind,” Sherlock breaks off when Magnussen snorts.

He acts exasperated at the lack of respect. He needs Magnussen to believe he is only interested in the letters, that he’s not a threat. He had expected all of this. However he wasn’t quite expecting the reference to Redbeard, his beloved dog and companion from his youth.

Mycroft? Had Sherlock been closer to the truth about Mycroft being under Magnussen’s thumb? He plays up the shock and lets the negotiation continue.

When Magnussen pulls the letters out of his pocket to show them, Sherlock is delighted. Magnussen obviously believes that there is nothing Sherlock can do about them. He is taunting him one last time, but it’s exactly the type of information Sherlock was looking for.

Once Magnussen is gone Sherlock turns to John, but he seems to have missed the point again. Sherlock can forgive him this time though; Magnussen’s tactics are especially brutal.

“He’s brought the letters to London, so no matter what he says, he’s ready to make a deal. Now, Magnussen only makes a deal once he’s established a person’s weakness, the pressure point he calls it,” Sherlock explained as he grabbed his coat off the hook by the door. “So clearly he believes I’m a drug addict and no serious threat. And because he’s in town tonight, the letters will be in his safe in his London office while he’s out to dinner with the Marketing group of Great Britain from seven till ten.”

“How do you know his schedule?” John asked.

Sherlock doesn’t have time to get into that right now. It will all be revealed later tonight anyway. Would John think him unfeeling when he finds out about his manipulation of Janine? He hopes not, hopes John can see past the necessity of his deception, again.

“Because I do,” he answered instead. “Right, I’ll see you tonight. I’ve got some shopping to do,”

It will be a waste to buy a perfectly good engagement ring for Janine, but needs must. It likely won’t even get to her and Sherlock will be able to return it.

“What’s tonight?" John asked as Sherlock started down the stairs.

 Sherlock paused and called back, “I’ll text instructions.”

“Yeah, I’ll text you if I’m available,” John said.

Sherlock turned back to look at John who was still in the open door way to 221B, and looked him in the eye. Surely John was interested. He wouldn’t abandon him again would he? Sherlock was getting quite sick of the mix of disappointment and betrayal he got then John told him he couldn’t make it.

“I need you,” he blurted out before he could think. He then quickly added, “Besides, you are free, I checked!” he forced a wide smile on his face before turning to continue down the stairs.

Sherlock didn’t know what he would do if John refused to show up. From experience he should, he’s following Sherlock down the stairs and an intriguing case like this has always hooked John in the past. But recently Sherlock hasn’t been as good at predicting John’s actions. It’s been extremely troubling.

“Don’t bring a gun,” he said.

“Why would I bring a gun?” John asked. Yes Sherlock is sure he’ll be there, 88% sure at least.

“Or a knife, or a tyre lever. Probably best not to do any arm spraining, but we’ll see how the night goes,” he continued.

He is purposefully reminding John of all the excitement that has happened lately. John craves excitement, the thrill of the chase, he always has. He thrives on adrenaline. It can’t hurt to remind him of the exciting life that Sherlock leads him to.

Sherlock waves his hand to call down a cab.

“You’re just assuming I’m coming along?” John asked.

“You will be invaluable to me,” Sherlock said honestly. He also knows John likes to feel important, It’s just a shame he can’t see how important he really is to Sherlock. “Besides, You need you get out of the house John, you’ve put on seven pounds just since I got back, and the cycling isn’t doing it,” Sherlock opened the door to the cab that had just pulled up.

He briefly wonders why he always feels the need to hide his sentimentality in barbs and jabs.

“It’s actually four pounds,” John objected.

“No sorry John, definitely seven. See you later,” Sherlock settled into the cab and pulled the door closed before turning to the driver.

“Hatton garden,” he instructs.

He wonders if John would believe him if he outright told him how he cares? He knows John doesn’t believe he is a sociopath, but has his is uncaring mask become too hard to see though?


	19. Into the lion's den

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter just got away from me, which is why it also took so long to complete. It's the longest chapter yet because I just couldn't bring myself to split it up. Hope you all enjoy! :)

John had turned up and Sherlock was happier than he’s been for a long while. He genuinely enjoyed working with John. He was capable of looking at things in a way that Sherlock never could, even if his connections weren't always correct.

After entering the building and going through security Sherlock insisted that they visit the cafeteria to grab take away coffees.  Always look like you belong, Sherlock found that a great way to go unnoticed in places he probably shouldn’t be.

“That’s Magnussen’s private lift,” Sherlock pointed out to John as they neared it. “It goes straight to his penthouse and office. Only he uses it and only his key card calls the lift. Anyone else even tries, security is automatically informed.”

Sherlock pulled out a key card from his pocket and showed it to John.

“This one’s a standard key card for the building, I nicked it yesterday, but it won’t get us far. What do you think will happen if I use this card on that lift right now?” Sherlock can’t help but ask John’s opinion, he’s also realised over the years that John responds better when he feels a part of the plan. Besides, this way is much more fun.

“Er, the alarms would go off and you’d be dragged away by security,” said John.

“Exactly,” he said, glad John was on the same page.

“And you’d get taken to a small room somewhere and your head kicked in,” John continued.

Sherlock had to try extremely hard for his imagination to not conjure up a scene very similar to that which had happened near the end of his time away. He swallowed down the rest of his coffee to give himself a distraction.

“Do we really need so much colour?” he managed to ask.

“It passes the time,” John said.

Sherlock didn’t know what to think about the fact that John presumably imagined violent acts against him. Currently it was hard to tell if John was joking or not. It was disconcerting.

“Right, well what if I do this?” Sherlock first handed John his empty cup before he got out his phone and pressed the key card to it.

 “If you press a key card too close to your phone for long enough, it corrupts the magnetic strip, the card stops working. It’s a common problem,” he explained to John.

People always complained when their cards failed to read properly, blaming the card readers, the bank, not realising it was their own ignorance in keeping their cards too close to their phone.

“So what would happen if I tried to use the card now?”

“It still doesn’t work,” John said. He still hadn’t gotten there then.

“No, but it doesn’t read as the wrong card now. Instead it registers as corrupted. But if it’s corrupted, how do they know it’s not Magnussen? Would they risk dragging him off?” said Sherlock.

“Probably not,” John admitted.

“So what would they have to do?” he pressed.

“Check if it’s him or not,” John said.

He was coming around, good. It was always easier to get John to come to his own conclusions rather than just telling him something would work.

“There’s a camera at eye height to the right of the door, a live picture of the card user is relayed to Magnussen’s personal staff in his office; the only people trusted to make a positive ID. At this hour, almost certainly his PA.” Sherlock explained. His whole plan depended on the fact that it would be Magnussen’s PA up in the office.

“So how’s that going to help us?” John asked.

“Human error,” Sherlock smiled, but he was almost certain it came out as a grimace. Human error indeed, though he never imagined that he would be the one at fault.

John still looked confused but Sherlock didn’t comment further. He knew everything would come out in a minuted anyway, so he approached the lift and pressed the card to the reader.

“You realise you don’t exactly look like Magnussen,” John pointed out.

“In this case it’s a considerable advantage,” was all Sherlock was going to say for now.

Sherlock steeled himself against the backlash that he knew would come from this and put on his best loving boyfriend smile for Janine.

“Sherlock you complete loon! What are you doing?” came Janine’s voice through the intercom, exactly as Sherlock was expecting.

“Hang on, was that?” John sounded surprised, obviously he recognised the voice.

 Sherlock wished he could turn to see his expression, but he needed to focus. He reminded himself that this is almost over.

“Hi Janine,” he made a show of looking around, as of worried there would be someone watching. “Go on, let me in.”

“I can’t. You know I can’t. Don’t be silly,” Janine said, obviously both shocked and delighted to see him.

“Don’t make me do it out here, not,” he paused to look around again, “not in front of everyone.”

“Do what in front of everyone?” she asked.

He took a deep breath before he pulled the ring box out of his pocket. After popping it open he held it up close to the camera and turned on what Janine called his puppy dog eyes and smiled brightly. She had always fallen for that look in the past.

The light on the card reader turned from red to blue and the lift doors opened. Sherlock started walking into the lift when John caught his arm.

“That was Janine,” he said.

“Yes,” Sherlock paused, not sure how to approach this so that John didn’t think him completely careless. “She’s Magnussen’s PA.”

“Did you just get engaged to break into an office?” John’s voice was loaded with disbelief.

“Yes,” he said slowly before stepping into the lift properly. It was probably for the best if people didn’t see them loitering around the open doors of Magnussen’s private lift.

John dumped the two empty coffee cups he was still holding in the bin beside the lift before following Sherlock. John looked at him, obviously expecting him to elaborate about Janine.

“It wasn’t ideal, but when I met her and found out who she worked for, well,” he shrugged.

John was gaping at him. “Jesus Sherlock, she loves you!” he said quietly to Sherlock once the doors closed.

“It’s unfortunate, human error as I said,” said Sherlock.

John looked disappointed. “What are you going to do?”

“Well, not actually marry her, obviously. I do like her as a person, but ah, not like that. She’s not really my type,” Sherlock said honestly, if a little awkwardly.

“So you do actually have a type?” John asked. Then, as if realising what he had just said continued before Sherlock could reply. “No, sorry, uh, so what will you tell her?”

Sherlock turned to briefly look at John before turning back towards the doors. “The truth, that will likely work best. That I needed her to break into her boss’s office.”

The lift stopped and the doors opened out into Magnussen’s office. Sherlock put on his happy boyfriend (fiancé) mask, hopefully for the last time, and looked around the room. When he didn’t immediately see Janine he let the smile slip from his face, slightly concerned. She had been right here a few minutes ago.

“So where did she go?” John asked, exactly what Sherlock had been thinking.

Rounding the desk they were able to see her sprawled across the floor.

“Did she faint? Is that a thing women actually do?” he asked as they walked closer.

John hurried over to check her and showed Sherlock the blood on the back of her head.

“It’s a blow to the head,” he was now bent low over her. “She’s breathing. Janine?” he called to her.

She moaned but remained otherwise unresponsive.

Sherlock entered detective mode just as John had let his doctoring instincts come forward now that he had a patient to look after. There was a man unconscious in the other room but going by the tattoos he was both an ex-con and a white supremacist. Sherlock told John to stay with Janine, though he knew John would probably check the man over after making sure Janine would be okay. 

Sherlock moved on in his investigation of the other room, he looked over the desk and found the chair was still warm.

“Hey, they must still be here.” John whispered from the doorway.

Sherlock turned towards him.

“So is Magnussen. His seat is still warm. He should be at dinner but he’s still in the building,” said Sherlock. Something was very not right here.

“Upstairs,” he suggested after looking around.

“We should call the police,” John said while taking his phone out of his pocket.

“No wait, shh,” Sherlock whispered.

He could smell something, a perfume, but not the one Janine used. He had become quite familiar with her favourite perfumes as of late. Sherlock went through his mental catalogue of scents.

Clair-de-la-lune.

It was familiar, but where had he smelt it before?

“Why do I know it?” he muttered out loud. He must have also spoken the name of the perfume out loud too because John soon replied.

“Mary wears it."

“No, not Mary, somebody else.”

A series of noises sounded from upstairs and Sherlock turned and ran towards the stairs that lead upstairs to Magnussen’s penthouse.  He knew who it was.

Sherlock crept down the hallway and as he got closer to the door he could hear Magnussen talking. He sounded distressed, even like he could be on the verge of tears.

“What, what, what would he think ey?” Sherlock heard Magnussen stutter. “He, your love, so upright, honourable…”

Sherlock reached the door and could see though the gap that Magnussen was on his knees with his hands behind his back. In front of him and with their back to the door was a figure dressed all in black, and pointing a gun directly towards Magnussen.

“…so English, what, what would he say to you now?” Magnussen continued.

The gun was cocked and Magnussen whimpered, “Nej, nej!” he cried.

Sherlock took this as his chance to enter the room and pushed through the door.

“You’re doing this to protect him from the truth, but is this protection he would want?” Magnussen asked his attacker.

Sherlock hadn’t anticipated this, hadn’t expected Lady Smallwood to have taken things into her own hands, especially after asking for Sherlock’s help, but the scent of her perfume was unmistakable. He moved to stand behind her.

“Additionally, if you’re going to commit murder, you may consider changing your perfume, Lady Smallwood,” Sherlock said.

He watched as Magnussen straightened a little and let out a long breath. Well it was almost worth it to see such a powerful man on his knees and genuinely terrified.

“That’s, ah, not Lady Smallwood Mr Holmes,” Magnussen said.

Sherlock was momentarily thrown. Who else could it be?

When she turned around he felt as though he had been punched in the gut. He simply couldn't believe that she was actually aiming a gun at his chest. Mary, John’s fiancée.  Mary, the woman he both liked and resented because of her relationship with John, who was lovely and made John so very happy. Here she was dressed as an assassin, about to kill Magnussen, and now with her gun trained on Sherlock. Liar.

How had he missed it? Was he so tied up in his own emotional drama that he has missed such deception? He knew he hadn’t been at his best lately but something like this should have been harder to hide.

“Is John with you?” she asked, knocking him out of his turbulent thoughts.

“He’s um,” Sherlock was genuinely shaken.

“Is John here?” she asked, firmer this time.

“He’s, he’s downstairs,” he managed to get out. Here was the woman whose wedding he had been helping to plan. It had hurt every time to see them together and to be helping with something that seemed to be driving John only further away from him. He’d endured it though, for John, because it made him happy. The thought that he could have been suffering for nothing ran through his mind. He could no longer predict this situation. Due to his feelings for John, it seemed Mary had become a massive blind spot. Looking at her now it was obvious that she was trained to kill, in the way she held herself and the confidence with which she held the gun.

He had been kept apart from john by a lie.

“So what do you do now? Kill us both?” Magnussen asked.

Surely there had to be some truth to her lie, there usually was. Sherlock knew from experience that even the smallest bit of truth made the lie easier, more believable.

“Mary, whatever he’s got on you, let me help,” Sherlock offered, he took a small step forward.

Mary shook her head, “Oh Sherlock, if you take one more step I will kill you.”

Surely she cared enough about John not to kill his best friend? Was her love even true? It had to be. Another part of him wished it too was part of the lie.

“No, you won’t,” he hoped desperately that he was right. He took another small step forward.

She pulled the trigger and he felt the impact, though he wasn't sure if the pain he felt was from the bullet or the shock and hurt of betrayal. He stared down at his chest in shock and distantly heard Mary say she was sorry before all his thoughts started to run overtime trying to analyse his situation.

Right, bullet in his chest, blood pouring down over his shirt.

Molly was here. Was she? What was she doing here? Doesn’t matter, she was giving him advice. She’s good at that. Advice about dying? Not dying, yes please. Can he please not die? Molly knows all about death, she worked in a morgue after all. He should listen to her.

What was Mycroft doing here? He’s the last person Sherlock wanted to see if he was dying. Mycroft always thought he was so superior, always putting him down, calling him stupid. He was a rubbish older brother. He had been trying to be better recently.

Mycroft wanted to know about the mirror. Oh yes he remembered the mirror, it had been beside the door, and behind him when he had walked into the room. No it hadn’t smashed; he would have noticed the noise of it. That meant the bullet hadn’t passed though and was still inside of him, he needed to fall backwards to slow the blood flow out of the bullet wound.

Perhaps Mycroft wasn’t so bad after all. Yes he agreed, he needed something to calm him down.

He remembered Redbeard, his childhood companion. He’d been so happy back then, having adventures with his dog; so loyal and friendly, so loving.

He had managed to calm down but now the pain, oh the pain! He needed control.

Suddenly there was Moriarty and they are both in a padded cell. This was just his mind palace, wasn’t it? Moriarty was dead, Sherlock had borne witness to it, to the maniac look in his eyes and the bang and the blood.

Moriarty was taunting him. “You’re letting him down Sherlock. John Watson is definitely in danger,” he said.

John.

John!

John was in danger. His wife was a liar, a killer. Mary had shot Sherlock and so could also be a danger to John. He had to tell him, warn him, save him.

He can’t save John if he’s dead.

John hated liars.

Sherlock loved John. Was he a liar too?

In that moment he knew for certain that he did love John and he didn't want to die without John knowing the truth. All of the truth.


	20. Where is Sherlock?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this chapter is so late! I've just started going to classes 3 days a week and that plus work mean's I don't have as much free time as I used to. I'll probably have to change updates to every two weeks. If I can get anything sooner though, I'll post it as soon as it's done. I'll see how I go with this new scheduled. For now, I hope you enjoy!

“You won’t tell him will you Sherlock?”

Was that Mary? Yes he recognised her voice. What couldn’t he tell John?

Why did he feel so drowsy? It felt like he was on drugs, an opioid of some kind. He was quite familiar with the effects of those. He didn’t remember using anything like that recently, though that wasn’t evidence that he hadn’t.

There was a beeping noise, it was quite annoying actually. Oh, it was the sound of a heart rate monitor.

Mary had shot him in the chest. It all came back to him. He was obviously in a hospital bed recovering from potentially lifesaving surgery and the removal of the bullet from his chest. Well that would account for the tightness in his chest and the drowsiness, he would be attached to a morphine drip for the pain.

Sherlock opened his eyes slowly and let them adjust to the light. He looked around, but Mary was no longer in the room. He was sure he remembered her speaking, but how long ago that was, it was hard to tell. He was sure he hadn’t imagined it.

She was right about one thing though, he couldn’t just tell John. John needed to be shown the truth, he needed to hear it from her, or else he would always have a seed of doubt in his mind. He needed to give Mary no choice but to tell him.

Sherlock needed to make a plan, but he would need a clearer head and his phone back for that.

He felt himself drifting asleep again. Next time he was awake he would have to turn down his morphine dosage.

*******

Mycroft had been the one to give him his phone back. The git actually looked genuinely concerned. Sherlock was just surprised to see him in the first place, hovering awkwardly at the side of his bed when Sherlock had woken from another nap. He had asked about the shooter, Sherlock knew he would, but he had refused to say anything, just as he had so far refused John and Lestrade’s questions. He didn't need Mycroft meddling further in his affairs, especially not with something concerning John.

Janine had been the next to come in.  Sherlock had woken to the cover of a newspaper with the headline ‘Shag a lot Holmes’ filling his vision. It seemed Janine had made up a story about him for the tabloids. Well, he considered that a fair exchange. He had used her, she had used him. He was just glad she hadn’t become emotional; he still had no clue how to deal with emotional women. As far as he was concerned this was the far better outcome, even if he had to deal with the rumour’s that he was a sex addict with a fetish for that idiotic dear stalker hat.

Janine had been an interesting character to be around and perhaps she was right in that they could have been friends under different circumstances, but Sherlock was just glad the whole charade was all over. Did all relationships take so much effort? He certainly hoped not. His friendship with John had been so much easier. Would that change if their relationship changed? What would a romantic relationship with John be like? He didn’t dare let his imagination take that thought too far, not when he still wasn’t sure how John would react to his feelings. When he told him? Either way there was this whole business with Mary to deal with first.

Part of him was delighted that he now had something on Mary that could end her relationship with John. Another part of him didn’t want John to know because it would just cause him more pain. He was so happy with her and his new life and it felt like a great shame to ruin that, even if it left Sherlock without. This caring lark was so tiring. It certainly had been easier caring only for himself, if retrospectively quite lonely.

Well, he resolved, it wasn’t his fault that Mary was a lying assassin, and now that he knew the truth wasn’t it his duty as John’s best friend to let him know? Sherlock couldn’t be sure if other aspects of her were a lie as well, or how dangerous she could be to John.  What Sherlock did know was that John wouldn’t forgive him if he kept such a secret, even if he didn’t like the truth.

********

Sherlock spent the rest of that afternoon contacting Wiggins and others from his homeless network to set up everything he needed for his trap. Mary, or whatever her real name was, had to be extremely clever to keep up such a deception for so long, but Sherlock was going to prove he was better.

Once the pain in his chest was manageable, Sherlock escaped the hospital, confident his plan was ready to set in motion. He had to act now before Mary decided to do something, obviously she had pressing issues with Magnussen which could still prove problematic. She had attempted to assassinate him after all.  Magnussen was likely lying low for now, but he was another variable in this equation that Sherlock wasn’t sure about. No, the sooner John was aware, the better.

Once Sherlock was in place he called John and told him where to meet.

*******

“Sherlock?” he heard John call down the empty concrete corridor.

“John.”

“Thank God! Everyone’s been looking for you and I wasn’t sure what I’d find when I got here.” John said, as he walked up to Sherlock. “Right, so what are we doing here? You have a bloody great hole in your chest, literally bloody, and you’re lucky to be alive. You should be resting in bed, not playing hide and seek around London.”

“I needed to speak to you privately,” Sherlock said.

“Yeah, I got that from the ‘Don’t tell anyone where you’re going John’. I didn’t, by the way, despite my better judgement. So what’s so important that you had to leave the hospital? You couldn’t have said John, could I have a word? Mind closing the door? You’re going to break your stitches!” John came forward to examine Sherlock’s bandaged chest. “Is this about the shooter? That’s the only thing I can think of that could even come close to risking your life further for.”

“Too many ears in a hospital, too much chance of being overheard, even with the door closed. And yes, it is about the shooter, I assume you realised I would know who it was, they were facing me when I was shot after all.”

“Greg and I were wondering about that, so you did recognise them?” John asked.

“I did,” Sherlock swallowed nervously, “do you recall how I identified the perfume in Magnussen’s office?”

“Oh, uh yes. Clare-de-la-lune, I remember because that’s what Mary wears,” John said.

“Yes, initially I assumed it to be from Lady Elizabeth Smallwood, she wore the same perfume when she came to see me about her case. It’s quite distinctive and I have a good memory for scents, however that’s not who I found up in Magnussen’s penthouse,” Sherlock explained.

“Well who was it? Another woman, another blackmail victim?”

“Yes to both I believe. I did find another woman up there; gun pointed directly at Magnussen, and with the bearing of someone trained to use a weapon. A professional.  But John, I promise you I didn’t even suspect it, she was so well at hiding it.”

“Who was it Sherlock?” John pressed.

Sherlock took a deep breath, only partially to elevate the pain creeping back into his chest as the morphine started to wear off. “You said it yourself when you named the only other woman I knew who wore that specific perfume. Mary, John. It was Mary who also wear’s Clare-de-la-lune, and she who I found holding a gun to Magnussen. She was the one who shot me.”

“No, she, “John swore violently. “You’re sure it was her? You couldn’t have been mistaken? I’ve been living with her for months and she’s never given any sign she was ever anything, anything like that! Jesus!” John started to pace the empty hallway.

“I’m so sorry John,” Sherlock said, and found he was sincerely sorry. He hated seeing John so distressed.

“I, you’re sure it was her?” John asked again.

“I was shot in the chest at close range. She was facing me when she shot me; there was no mistaking who it was. Even Magnussen could attest to that, though I’m sure he’ll stay quiet at least for now. Again, I’m sorry John,” Sherlock said.

“Why are you sorry? You’re the one who was bloody shot!” John swore again.

“John,” Sherlock said slowly and calmly, “If she's as smart as I think she is, then Mary should be here soon. You can hear it from her, I, well, I had a plan in case you didn’t believe me.”

“I yes, yes. Not that I don’t believe you but it’s just hard to imagine. Jesus! Yes I think I would like to hear it from her,” he swore again. “Why does this keep happening to me?”

“I am sorry for my part in this,” Sherlock said softly.

“No, don’t be. I chose her, or well she chose me,” said John. He stopped pacing and took a deep breath before turning to Sherlock. “Right, yes. So what’s this plan of yours?”


	21. Deception

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Sorry It's taken so long, this has actually been written for a few days but I haven't had time to type it up. Hope you all enjoy. :)

Sherlock got the cue from Wiggins and called the phone that he’d given to him. He had set this all up for her, the lie of Leinster Gardens, hidden in plain sight. He couldn’t help but put some of his frustration and pain into his harsh comments to her and through the form of his plan. She had lied to John and hurt Sherlock in more ways than one, even if she didn’t know it. With his chest throbbing, he couldn’t be bothered to censor himself.

John was all set up in the chair at the end of the corridor. He’d made sure the lighting was just right to only show his silhouette sitting in the wheelchair hair ruffled to make it look like Sherlock’s and his coat collar popped up. He had been able to do a lot of research from his hospital bed, a text here, a call there and the rest he’s learnt through online searches. There wasn’t much you could hide in the age of the internet, if you knew where to look. His homeless network had also helped set up the giant projection of Mary’s face on the outside of the building, a picture taken from her social network page.

“Mary Morstan was stillborn in October 1972. Her gravestone is in Chiswick cemetery where five years ago, you acquired her name and date of birth, and thereafter her identity. That’s why you don’t have friends from before that date,” he said to Mary over the phone.

He remembered the talk about who they were inviting to the wedding, he can’t believe that had only been a couple of weeks ago. Orphan, she’d said to explain her lack of family, lost touch with her childhood friends. Not unbelievable, he hadn’t thought anything of it at the time.

“It’s an old enough technique, known to the kinds of people who can recognise a skip code on sight, someone who also has an extraordinary retentive memory.”

If he thought back now, to when John had been kidnapped and put into the bonfire, it should have been obvious. At the time though, he had been solely focused on finding and saving John. He had also thought that the kidnapping had something to do with him, someone who knew John was his weak spot, like Moriarty had. He realised now that someone had been targeting Mary, and if they were, than that meant she had something significant in her past that she was hiding. Serious enough she would risk killing her blackmailer to hide it.

“You were very slow,” said Mary.

‘Caring is not an advantage,’ Mycroft’s voice filtered through Sherlock’s mind again. How he so hated that saying but he had to admit that it was true in this circumstance. He wondered if he would have been able to detect the truth sooner if he hadn’t been stuck in his own emotions. It was impossible to determine.

“How good of a shot are you?” he asked, ignoring her last comment.

“How badly do you want to find out?” She took her gun out of her bag.

By now Mary had just entered the corridor, from there she would be able to see John. He can’t have her mistakenly shooting him though. He’s still not sure of her intentions. He reminded her of the fact that there was a large projection of her face on the facade of the building for everyone to see.

“I want to know how good you are. Go on, show me. The doctor’s fiancée must be getting a little bored by now,” he taunted.

Sherlock crept closer to the doorway, which Mary had left open behind her. Hidden in the shadows she shouldn’t be able to see him, but he had a good view of her. He watched as she reached into her bag and pulled out a coin. She flicked it in the air and fired.

Sherlock walked in through the door and Mary turned towards him. He lowered the phone from his ear to speak directly to her.

“May I see?”

Mary turned back to look at John. “It’s a dummy,” she said while taking the phone headset off her ear. “I suppose it was a fairly obvious trick.”

She walked over to where the coin had landed and used her foot to slide it over the floor towards Sherlock.

Bending to retrieve the coin was extremely painful. It was hard enough holding himself upright, but bending down put pressure directly on the wound and pulled the skin around it. Sherlock was sure he would end up bleeding internally after this; he had certainly pulled some stitches. He just hoped they could finish this up quickly.

Back upright again, though with one shoulder leaning against the wall, Sherlock examined the coin. A hole went straight through, just off centre. That took a lot of practice.

“And yet over a distance of six feet you failed to make a kill shot,” Sherlock had to take a deep breath before he spoke again. The powers of the morphine were well and truly gone by now. He just needed to last a little longer. John, he was doing this for John, who deserved to know the truth. “Enough to hospitalise, me but not enough to kill me. That wasn’t a miss, that was surgery.”

He didn’t leave her time to respond. “You’ve lied to John,” Sherlock accused. He fell back further against the wall. “Why didn’t you just come to me with the case? You know my reputation.”

“Because John can’t ever know that I lied to him. It would break him and I would lose him forever, and Sherlock, I will never let that happen.”

Sherlock managed to pull himself up enough to stumble over to the fuse box from where he could turn on the rest of the lights in the corridor.

“Not that obvious a trick,” he watched Mary’s face as she figured out his trick.

She took a deep breath and turned slowly to see John, now visible sitting in the wheelchair. He looked furious with his mouth doing that twitchy, angry, almost smile that Sherlock had realised he was barely holding back how angry he really was.

John stood slowly and pushed down his coat collar. He was walking slowly towards Mary, his posture stiff when his eyes shifted their focus and landed on Sherlock, who was once again slumped against the wall.

“Jesus Sherlock!” he rushed forward, completely bypassing Mary and put his arm around Sherlock to take some of his weight.

Unexpectedly Sherlock found himself pressed against John’s side and being guided to the wheelchair. It had just been here for a prop, but Sherlock was grateful for it right now.

“We need to get you back to the hospital you great idiot,” John said.

"No I'll be fine for a while longer, you two need to sort everything out, we'll go back to Baker Street."

"You're not risking your life again for my sake Sherlock, no," John turned to Mary. "You, you can wait, but be sure that we're having a conversation after Sherlock's back in hospital and I don't want to see you until then," John ordered in his army captain voice. He was gripping the handles of the wheelchair so tightly that Sherlock could hear the rubber handle covers squeak.

Mary nodded, her mouth shut in a thin line.

John found a cab and helped Sherlock into the back seat before folding up the chair to put in the boot. He climbed in next to Sherlock and without another glance at Mary, slammed the door shut with more force than the cabby probably would have liked.

"St Barts Hospital," he barked to the cabby, and that was the last time he spoke the entire ride back.

*****

Once he was readmitted, Sherlock was sent in for more surgery to fix the damage he'd done to his wound. It took him a day and a half to fully wake from the antithetic. When he finally did he found John frowning down at him. "John?" he asked groggily.

"You're a complete idiot," John said.

"Genius," Sherlock argued back weakly.

"It's possible to be both at once," John practically growled. "What made you put your life in danger again?"

"You needed to know the truth, couldn't keep a secret from you again," Sherlock mumbled.

John sighed heavily.

"You wanted a discussion, so Mary's coming around soon. I haven't talked to her since the other night and you're right, I should know what the bloody hell is going on with the woman I'm planning to marry. Was planning to marry. Jesus! I don't even know if that’s still going ahead. I just can't imagine it at the moment."

"Ears John," Sherlock reminded him.

"You're not leaving that bed, and I need you here when I speak to her. Your brother bloody paid for a private room and the door is closed, that will have to be good enough," John said.

"Fine, but help me up. I'm not continuing this conversation while starting at the ceiling," Sherlock said.

John frowned but reached over to put the top of the bed in an upright position so that Sherlock could look at him while they spoke. After that John took the seat next to the bed.

"I still can't believe she actually," he waved towards Sherlock's bandaged chest.

"I don't think she had a choice," Sherlock admitted, "shoot Magnussen and you would be found in the building, an easy suspect. Shoot both of us, well, same problem really."

"I don't want to live in a world where there's no choice but for my girlfriend to shoot my best friend," John said angrily, though still keeping his volume down, for which Sherlock was grateful. He also noted John's slip back to girlfriend from fiancée.

There was a polite knock in the door. John got up to answer and found Mary standing on the other side looking extremely weary. John looked furious.

"John, imagine we're back at Baker Street, sitting in our chairs. What would she be?" Sherlock asked.

John looked at him wearily.

"Other than my lying girlfriend?"

"Other than that, yes. What would she be?" he asked again.

John huffed. "Fine, your way," John moved the chair from the other side of Sherlock’s bed and placed it near the foot of the bed so that it was facing them both. He then retook his seat beside Sherlock and pointed to the chair.

“Sit,” he said.

Mary looked puzzled but sat anyway. “What’s going on?”

“If we were at Baker Street that would be where they sit, the people who come to us with their stories. The clients. That’s what you are right now Mary, you’re the client. This is where you sit and talk and this is where we sit and listen, then decide if we want you or now,” John explained.

Sherlock couldn’t help but feel a thrill at having John back on his side, of being included in that ‘we’. Sherlock and John as the team that they had been in the past, a feeling that he had sorely missed.

Mary sighed and pulled a flash drive out of her bag and handed it over to John.

“A.G.R.A, what’s that?” he asked as he saw the letters on the side.

Mary looked between them before answering. “Er, my initials. Everything about who I was is on there,” she looked John directly in the eyes, “if you love me don’t read it in front of me.”

“Why?” John asked he broke eye contact and looked down at the flash drive. He turned it over in his hands, as if he could learn all of her secrets by just looking at it. Sherlock was itching to plug it into his computer and see what information it held. He knew he couldn’t though; it all had to be on John’s terms.

Mary looked close to tears, but Sherlock wasn’t sure if it was real or not. It would be believable for the Mary that he knew, but he wasn’t sure how much of her was real and how much was the assumed persona of Mary Morstan.

“Because you won’t love me when you’re finished, and I don’t want to see that happen,” she said.

So she did actually love John?

Mary turned to Sherlock. “How much do you know already?”

“From your skill set you are, or were, an intelligence agent. Your accent is currently English but I suspect you are not. You’re on the run from something and you’ve used those skills to disappear. Magnussen knows your secret, which is why you tried to kill him and that you, like I, got close to Janine to get to him,” said Sherlock.

“The stuff Magnussen has on me, I would go to prison for the rest of my life,” Mary admitted.

John swore. “That bad? So you were just going to kill him?”

“People like Magnussen should be killed. That’s why there are people like me.”

Johns mouth was twitching again in anger and the knuckles on his hands were white with how strong his grip was on the arms of his chair.

“Oh my God! So that’s what you were? An assassin? I was about to get married to an assassin on the run from the law!” he swore again. “Well it’s a good thing learnt all this now before the wedding. I can’t believe we were just closing invitation colours,” John’s face had drained of most of its colour. He looked warn and defeated.

“So Mary, any documents that Magnussen has concerning yourself you want extracted and returned,” Sherlock continued, ignoring John’s questions for now.

“You want to help her?” John looked at Sherlock in shock.

“She could have killed me outright but decided not to. One precisely calculated shot to incapacitate me in the hope that it would buy her more time to negotiate my silence. I suppose I should also thank her for phoning the ambulance.”

“What? I phoned the ambulance,” John argued.

“She called first. You didn’t find me for another five minutes; left to you I would have died. The average call time for an ambulance in London is approximately eight minutes,” Sherlock explained.

“But she couldn’t have known they would get there on time,” John turned back to Mary, “you couldn’t have. You still could have killed him.”

“You’re right, I couldn’t have known, but I did know the stats and I did hope,” she admitted.

“Hope! You gambled on his life!” John rose up from his chair, and it looked as though he was barely restraining himself from moving forward and doing something he would later regret.

“John,” Sherlock said to bring him back.

It worked and he sat again, though on the edge.

“I had no choice! If you hadn’t been there John, it would have been different. I could never implicate you, never put you through that,” she tried to defend herself.

“No, but you could take a chance with Sherlock’s life, make me think I was going to lose him again. You know what that did to me the last time,” said John.

Despite the situation Sherlock was warmed by John’s fierce defence of him. It had been way too long since he’d had John on his side like this.

“Mary, I think you had better leave, before I do something I’ll regret,” John said.

“Right, yes,” Mary said, sounding close to tears. She stood, both hands clutching tightly to her bag, and quietly left the room.

“Jesus!” John swore as soon as the door was closed again. “I can’t even…” He ran his hand through his hair and swore again. “I just though, I’ll have to contact everyone and cancel the wedding. I can’t even imagine carrying on after all of this. I don’t even know what I’m going to say to explain why. Sorry We are cancelling the wedding because my fiancée almost killed the best man?” he sounded slightly hysterical.

“I’m going to be fine John which is what matters. We’ll sort things between Mary and Magnussen and anything after that well, that’s up to you,” said Sherlock. He raised a hand up towards John’s shoulder, let it hover there for a few moments before somewhat awkwardly binging it down to pat John’s shoulder in what he hoped was a comforting gesture. “You ah, well I mean, you’d be welcome to stay at Baker Street until you sort everything. Only if you want, though I’m sure Mr’s Hudson would be delighted,” Sherlock said, not sure why it had been so hard to say. His heart beat had picked up at just the thought of having John back in the flat again.

“You okay?” John asked in concern as he noticed the spike in the heart beat monitor.

“Yes, just a bit of pain, nothing to worry about,” Sherlock covered quickly.

“I should leave you to rest,” John was looking over him with concern. “Thanks though, I think I’ll take you up on that, I hadn’t given it much thought honestly, I stayed here last night though I didn’t sleep much. I can’t imagine going home to Mary; I can’t handle seeing her at the moment. I don’t think I can look at her the same way knowing what I do. So yeah thanks, I’ll phone Mr’s Hudson,” he reached out to as if to touch Sherlock then moved his hand away, instead he smoothed down the blankets. “You stay in bed and rest, I’ll be back tomorrow,” he smiled wearily at Sherlock and lowered his bed back down.

“See you tomorrow,” Sherlock promised.

 

 

 


	22. Unexpected insight

Bored, bored, bored! Sherlock had been pursuing his emails via his phone and had already solved five petty problems in the past half hour. Recovery was so tedious. The nurse had given him the remote control for the television before running off, but crap telly had only ever been entertaining with John around to rile up.

 John himself had visited earlier in the morning for a few hours before he had to leave to ‘sort some things out.’ Sherlock knew part of that had to do with cancelling the wedding and figuring out if he could go back to work, along with moving some of his things over to Baker Street.

Now that was a strange thing to ponder, John Watson back at Baker Street. Sherlock had of course been wishing and hoping that it would happen but had honestly never expected for the hope to become reality. This whole business was almost too good to be true. Of course it currently included an angry and hurt John, so it wasn’t all good news. Despite this Sherlock couldn’t help but feel a flutter in his chest at the thought of John back (where he belonged) in the flat, pottering around, making tea, sitting in his chair—oh, right he hadn’t moved the chair back. He felt like he should leave for home and correct that error immediately. Where would John be sitting if not in his chair? On the couch or on Sherlock’s chair? For some reason he quite liked the idea of John sitting in his chair, his warmth seeping into the leather. It didn’t make any rational sense, but this whole ordeal concerning his feelings was anything but rational.

It was somewhat unfair that now John was black at Baker Street he was stuck here in this boring box of a room for the next few days. He had the—possibly not completely irrational—fear that John wouldn’t want to stay once Sherlock was out of hospital. Staying in the empty flat was one thing; living with Sherlock again was another thing entirely. There was even a small possibility that John may make up With Mary, though at the present time the probability of that happening was extremely low, around 15% if only because of his nature and his history of forgiveness towards Sherlock for an equally hurtful deceit; though Sherlock had to concede that John would likely take into account the reasons behind the deceit and the consequences thereof.

There was a soft tap on the door before it creaked open cautiously. It was Lestrade, and smiled when he saw Sherlock, opened the door wider and stepped inside before closing the door behind him.

“Nice to see you awake,” he said as he walked over to the seat beside the bed.

“I wish I were asleep, this place is mind numbingly dull. I can’t see why they won’t let me have my laptop,” Sherlock complained.

“Got someone to sneak that in I see,” Lestrade indicated towards the phone still in Sherlock’s hands.

“Yes, small mercies,” Sherlock conceded before slipping the phone back into his pillow case.

“So, it was an idiotic thing you did running off like that the other night. Put everyone in a right panic, and for good reason too since I head you came back and had to be rushed to surgery for internal bleeding,” Lestrade said.

“Couldn’t be helped,” said Sherlock.

“Oh I bet it could. I also bet you won’t be telling me why,” Lestrade was looking at him wearily.

“It’s all sorted,” was all Sherlock could say on the matter. It wasn’t his place to be sharing John and Mary’s secrets, especially not when they could land one of them in prison.

 “I hope so. I ah, had an odd conversation with John earlier. I have an inkling that he knows something of what went on but isn’t telling me. You two had better not be getting into something dangerous without telling anyone, you know how that ended up last time. I won’t pry; I just wish you’d ask for help before things get out of hand. Right?”

Sherlock paused before nodding. “I can assure you it is sorted. Nothing to worry about.” This seemed to appease Lestrade somewhat though he still looked slightly concerned.

“We’ll see about that. Though I did wonder if whatever went on may have something to do with John breaking it off with Mary and moving back to Baker Street. Called me to tell me the wedding was off and everything, it was a bit of a shock, as far as I knew they were both happy and excited about it. Then last I knew, they were both looking for you, now suddenly it’s all over. Must have been quite the fight,” he looked at Sherlock strangely.

“I didn’t have anything to do with it,” Sherlock defended. Well he hadn’t, not really. He’d only been at the wrong place at the right time.

Lestrade still looked sceptical.

“Not everything is about me,” said Sherlock moodily. Why did people always assume it was his fault when things went wrong?

“Well perhaps it’s not all bad news though,” Lestrade sounded suggestive.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I mean it’s not the best timing of course, but maybe it’s your opportunity to say something to John. It’s not my place I know, but to be honest, I’ve been having a hard time being happy for John and Mary after I’ve seen how miserable It’s all been making you. Mary is nice and everything, but perhaps it’s good if things have come to an end on their own,” Lestrade said.

“What are you suggesting?” Sherlock was almost certain, but he needed to be sure. He felt appalled if he had been so obvious with his feelings. “Have you been talking to Mycroft?”

“No, well yes I have, but it wasn’t hard to figure out on my own. I can tell by the way you look at him combined with the way you’ve been acting lately. Then there was what you said about orientations at the crime scene. Sometimes I think you forget that reading people is a part of my job. You’re in love with him.”

Sherlock felt his heart beat increase and looked around the room, paranoid that someone would be listening in.

“There are no bugs, I made sure. You’re allowed to be human Sherlock; your feelings are just as valid as anyone else’s,” Lestrade tried to reassure him.

“Not when they can never be returned,” Sherlock said bitterly. He felt it useless to keep up pretences now that Lestrade had found him out. What did it matter anymore? He already felt hollowed out and exposed.

“I don’t think that’s true. I mean yes, he likes women, but I’ve also seen the way he looks at you, back before all that business with Moriarty. I don't think it was sexual, but there was certainly something there. You were occasionally mistaken for a couple, that would't have happened if there was nothing to notice . I admit I had to do some research about those orientations you mentioned and as far as I can see, it’s entirely possible for John to be heterosexual and biromantic or something yeah?” Lestrade reasoned.

Lestrade had remembered a throwaway comment that Sherlock had made when he was too frustrated to censor his feelings, and actually researched it? He felt warmed towards the detective. Even after researching his own orientations he hadn’t thought to question John ‘I’m not gay’ Watson. Perhaps he hadn’t thought about it because if it proved true that would mean there was actually hope for him, and hope could be a dangerous thing.

“Doesn’t mean he’d be interested. Besides, sex is a big part of his life and I–”

“You’re asexual,” Lestrade finished for him, not unkindly.

“Yes,” Sherlock nodded.

“Sex isn’t the be all and end all of relationships you know. And personally I don’t feel John is the kind of bloke to have that as a deal breaker, not if he really loved someone.”

“But it’s not just sex is it? He was just engaged to be married, probably expecting to have children in the future. John takes family very seriously,” Sherlock countered.

“Well you’d just have to show him that there’s more than one kind of family then. Look Sherlock, I wouldn’t be suggesting anything if I didn’t think there was a chance that it could work.”

Sherlock was still sceptical. Why would John choose him over a stable woman with whom he could have a normal stable life with the possibility of biological children? Even if he wanted to keep excitement on the side, occasionally seeing Sherlock for cases. Sherlock couldn’t provide everything for John’s future that a woman could, or even another man, if John were so inclined.

Suddenly Sherlock’s right hand was enveloped in warmth, his hand stilled from where he had been unconsciously twisting the fabric of the sheet between his fingers. Lestrade had places his hand over his.

“Don’t be so hard on yourself. I know you; you can go round in circles inside your own head. Sometimes you just have to trust in other people, or outright ask if you want to know something. Observation and speculation can only go so far,” Lestrade patted his hand a few times before pulling away.

Sherlock’s hand felt tingly without it.

Lestrade cleared his throat. “Right, I think that’s quite enough of that emotional talk for now. I really should be going. Just think about it alright, and if you want to talk some more let me know,” he stood and smiled down at Sherlock. “I may not know everything that’s going on, but I’m just bloody glad you’re alright,”

“Thank you, for–” Sherlock started, he waved his hand about and tried to indicate everything Lestrade and said and done for him. For some reason he was at a lack for appropriate words.

“No trouble,” said Lestrade, “though no one will ever believe you thanked me.” He flashed a grin so that Sherlock knew the comment was light-hearted, and left before Sherlock could reply.

Well, Sherlock clearly had a lot to think about now.

 


	23. Home at last!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm finally on a two week break from classes, so I hope to get a few more chapters written before I go back on the 20th. *fingers crossed* Thanks to everyone still reading and as always I hope you enjoy!

The day had finally arrived, the day he was allowed to return home. Prescribed more bed rest and banned from any strenuous activity of course, plus regular visits to the doctor to make sure he was healing properly. Overkill in his opinion, especially with John so close by, even subconsciously he would be monitoring Sherlock’s condition. But none of that could dampen the joy of leaving his hospital bed behind. Just the sterile walls and general monochrome of the room was driving him mad, not to mention the fact that one of the nurses had found his phone the night before and confiscated it. Apparently it was both interfering with the instruments and hindering his recovery. Sherlock was sure he was regretting that decision by now and the whole department were likely glad to see the back of him. Sherlock could even put up with Mycroft’s hovering if it meant he would be able to go home.

Eventually he was pushed down to the lobby in a wheel chair and helped into one of Mycroft’s cars.

The journey to Baker Street was a quiet one, for which Sherlock was grateful. His joy at being able to return home was starting to mix with anxiety when he thought about once again cohabiting with John. He would be there waiting for them, having taken a few of his holiday weeks off work, some of which would have been used for his honeymoon Sherlock knew, though he never mentioned it. It was done out of the combination of wanting to stay away from Mary, who had already returned to work, and also wanting to be there to look after Sherlock once he was discharged.

Without Sherlock really noticing, they had pulled up right in front of 221B and Mycroft had opened his door and was trying to help him out of the car. He started at that hand for a moment, all round edges compared to his own long bony fingers, genetics from two different sides of the family.

“You’ve gone soft on me,” Sherlock said before grasping his brother’s hand.

“I rather think we both have,” Mycroft said with a quick glance up at 221B.

Sherlock grunted as he was helped up, his only concession to the truth of that statement. Together they stood staring at the door for a few moments before Mycroft stepped forward to unlock the door. When had he gotten a key? Sherlock wondered but didn’t mention it and just entered the hall after his brother.

The door to Mrs Hudson’s flat opened. “Oh Sherlock I was hoping that was you at the door,” She pushed past Mycroft to put a gentle arm around Sherlock. “Welcome back.”

“Glad to be back Mrs Hudson,” he said into her shoulder before she pulled away. He smiled warmly at her.

“Sherlock, is that you?” called John’s voice from upstairs.

“Just arrived,” Sherlock called back.

They could hear John’s footsteps as he thudded down the stairs.

“I see you’re in good hands. Good luck brother,” Mycroft said, and Sherlock could hardly believe that he had momentary forgotten he was there.

Sherlock just nodded at him, still surprised by this new, honest Mycroft who seemed to actually care.

“Thanks for picking him up,” John said as Mycroft turned to leave.

Mycroft didn’t turn around but waved his hand before closing the door behind him.

John moved to assist Sherlock up the stairs and Sherlock made to fend him off before changing his mind.

“He was surprisingly pleasant,” John said.

“Mhm, he was, it’s been dreadful,” sighed Sherlock.

“You don’t really mean that and we know it,” Mrs Hudson said as she followed them up the stairs. “You’ve been getting on so much better lately. It can’t be anything but a good thing.”

Sherlock hummed in reply but didn’t comment further.

“Here you go,” John said as he helped Sherlock into his armchair.

He then made to move towards the kitchen but Mrs Hudson stopped him.

“No John, you sit. I’ll put the kettle on,” she protested.

John opened his mouth, about to say something before thinking better of it and settling into his own chair. “Thank you,” he said.

Sherlock couldn’t help but stare at the chair. He hadn’t expected it to be there. It felt really bizarre for a moment, like he had gone back in time.

“I found this,” John said noticing where Sherlock was looking, he patted the arms. “It was a hassle to get it back in here. I’m afraid you’ll just have to put up with it blocking the view.”

But the view is so much better with you back, Sherlock thought. He had only dreamt that he would see John sitting back here in his chair.

“You okay Sherlock?” John asked.   

Sherlock realised that he had been staring, just processing the fact that John was back home (with him) sitting in his chair and holding the mug Mrs Hudson had just given him—oh he had missed her coming back, bit not good—but it just felt so right for the first time in a long while.

“I—” Missed you; am glad you’re back (love you) “um, this is good, nice, you er—” Sherlock said awkwardly as the words he really wanted to say just wouldn’t come out of his mouth.

John smiled. “I should be saying thanks for giving me a place to stay. You probably loved having all this space to yourself.”

“There’s always space for you here, if you want it,” Sherlock said earnestly.

“Thanks Sherlock, really. You’re unconventional and it may not seem like it from the outside but you’re a good friend.” John turned to Mrs Hudson. “Though how did you get him to organise the fridge?”

“Oh I had nothing to do with that dear. I don’t go anywhere near that fridge anymore, never know what I’m going to find so I daren’t even look,” she said. She was watching them fondly from the couch, barley hiding her smile behind her mug of earl grey.

“I, er took your advice,” said Sherlock, before taking up the mug that had been left for him on the side table. He took a large gulp of the still scorching liquid.

“Oh so you do listen to me when I ask you to do things,” John looked pleasantly surprised, if a bit bemused, “even if it takes you a while to act on it.”

“I always hear what you say, even if I don’t immediately process it,” Sherlock admitted.

“Good to know.”

“It’s so nice to have you around more regularly John, despite the circumstances of course. Sometimes I worry about Sherlock being here all on his own, and it’s good to know you’ll be here while he recovers.”

“Mrs Hudson!” Sherlock objected, “I’m perfectly capable of looking after myself.”

“Of course you are dear, but it’s nice to have some company, some help when you need it,” she looked at looked him in the eye with knowing look on her face.

Sherlock almost choked on his tea. Did everyone know? Well everyone except John it seemed. Well wasn’t that embarrassing.

“I’m happy to help, especially after what happened, well,” John paused and looked directly at Sherlock. “I know it’s silly but I feel slightly at fault for what happened the other night and I feel better knowing I’m here to watch over him.”

Oh, John was looking at him with a combination of affection and frustration. It was a look Sherlock was familiar with, but one he hadn’t seen for years. It was a look he had often seen on cases when John thought Sherlock was being unreasonable or difficult and Sherlock couldn’t see that he was.

“I’ll leave you boys to get settled in. I said I’d visit next door after I saw you up,” Mrs Hudson stood.

“Thanks again for having me back and for helping me set up,” John said

“Oh it was no trouble dear I wouldn’t have you stay anywhere else,” she said before she left.

********

The first night Sherlock didn’t sleep but simply laid in his bed and listened to subtle creaks that meant someone was living in the room upstairs. He stayed in bed long after John had woken the next morning, just listening to him move around and go about his morning routine. It was quite enjoyable  just to listen and be able to picture in his mind what John was doing. It was hard to believe that he had ever taken this for granted.

Eventually he knew it was time to get up or John would come in to wake him. He swung on his dressing gown and strode out to the kitchen. John looked up as he entered, his hair was still delightfully messy from sleep with the too long bits flopping down over her forehead. He would insist on getting a haircut soon.

“Morning,” John greeted, “How are you feeling?”

“As well as can be expected,” he answered. At that moment he wanted nothing more than to come up behind John, wrap his arms around him and press his face to the back of John’s neck.

Well that was quite unexpected.

“You sure you’re okay?” asked John.

Sherlock realised he had been staring at John again.

“Humm, oh yes,” he said before moving to pour himself a cup of tea.

He hoped he wouldn’t have any more moments like that; he couldn’t have John thinking there was something wrong with him.

Could he be turning into one of those sentimental fools that he had always despised in the past? He felt horrified to even entertain the notion. It was just the newness of the situation he concluded, coupled with the fact that couldn’t act on his new feelings. It had been so much easier before he was aware of them.

Was there a socially acceptable time between when someone broke up with their partner and when they began to see somebody else? There probably was, society liked having rules like that. It was one of those things he never would have observed but that John probably would. First though he needed for John to have all the facts.

Sherlock carried his tea into the sitting room and over to the desk where he had left his phone the night before. He sent a message to Lestrade asking where he had sourced his information on asexuality and romantic orientations. He needed to make sure he had information that was easy for John to comprehend and Lestrade should be a good measure for that.

He received a message twenty minutes later that simply said ‘Good luck’, followed by a list of links.

How did he know that Sherlock needed luck?

Sherlock retrieved his laptop and started opening up the links. Some of the pages were ones that Sherlock had already looked at; others were new but looked suitably informative. He looked to the side when he heard John move from the kitchen to this arm chair. He had just finished his breakfast and was settling down to read the paper, perfect.

Sherlock made sure all the correct tabs were open and easily accessible in the order he wanted John to read them for optimal effect, before picking up the laptop and carrying it over to him.

“I need you to read these pages,” he said while offering up the laptop.

“What, Sherlock is this for a case?”

When John didn’t immediately take the laptop he set it down on the little table next to the chair.

“No case, just read it,” after a pause he added, “please.”

John looked at him strangely, “alright,” he sighed.

Sherlock nodded, now to disappear while John absorbed that information. He turned to head for the bathroom. A nice long soak in the tub should do it.

“Make sure you keep your wound dry. I’ll redress it when you’re out,” John called after him when he realised where Sherlock was heading.

Well a good soak while making sure the top of his chest stayed above the water line. Sherlock couldn’t for the day when that blasted hole in his chest was healed enough for a proper full body soak.

 


	24. I didn't mean to say that.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where Sherlock reveals a bit more than he intended but decide's to roll with it anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HI again! So this chapter was much harder to write than I first though. I really hope I you like it, I've been looking forward to this part of the story for a long time! :)

Sherlock took his time in the bathroom, letting the warm water soak into his muscles, well as much as it could with his restrictions. It did work to calm him somewhat. He couldn’t believe how worked up he was about John finding out about him. He’d never worried about people knowing anything about him before. He was as he was and usually he didn’t care what people thought about that. Now though there were suddenly a few people in his life who’s opinion of him did matter, none more so than Johns.  

He exited the bath once his fingertips were starting to wrinkle a bit too much and took his time drying off and towelling his hair. He then moved into his room and took even more time picking out a shirt then getting dressed. He wasn’t sure why he was stalling; John was a decently paced reader, though nowhere near as fast as he was. Sherlock estimated he should have almost finished reading all the pages he’d opened by now.

Again he wondered what reason he had to be so worried about John’s reaction He was quite the reasonable man, a doctor who worked on facts, most of the time. He was a man who was usually open to new ideas. The only reason John disagreed with his sister was because of her alcoholism and the fact that she had been unfaithful to her wife. The fact that she had a wife at all wasn’t even an issue.  John valued loyalty after all. There was the slight issue of his repeated denial of being gay himself, but Sherlock rather suspected that as more about having an label he didn’t identify with forcefully put onto him, rather than a great opposition to actually being gay. Sherlock had never cared about what people thought of his sexual identity, but he knew that for some people it was quite important. Personally he didn’t feel the need to tell everyone he knew that he was asexual, the only person he really wanted to know was John, and if everyone else couldn’t be bothered to ask him, or figure it out for themselves, well they could assume what they liked.

Sherlock opened his bedroom door and shuffled out so he could peer into the sitting room where John was still hunched over the laptop. He looked quite engrossed in the text he was reading, his finger tapping every now and then on the down arrow.

Humm, perhaps while he was waiting for John to finish he should make something to eat, he was feeling a little peckish. He retrieved a few slices of bread and spread honey over them. Mmmm John had bought his favourite kind. Should he thank him? He looked over to John, mouth full of honeyed bread and froze.

John was looking back.

“This isn’t for a case is it,” Johns said.

Sherlock shook his head and tried to swallow as fast as possible without choking.

“Trying to tell me something?” John pressed kindly.

“Erm, yes,” Sherlock said, not sure how to continue. He hadn’t planned past providing John with the information, a slight oversight on his part. “As you’ve probably guessed from the information, I’m asexual,” he said, deciding to start with this part first, it seemed easiest.

“Okay,” John nodded.

“Okay?” Sherlock questioned.

“Well considering if what I’ve just read is correct, then yeah, it explains a lot. I must admit that I did wonder about you, ever since that first night at Angelo’s. So just to clarify, you’re not interested in sex with anyone?”

“I’m not attracted to anyone, but no I’m not interested in sex either. I’ve always found it–distasteful and unnecessary, “he said after a pause.  

“Distasteful? Sherlock have you even tried it?” John asked, he sounded disbelieving.

“I’ve experienced enough,” he shrugged. “It’s something that I’m rather happy to do without,”

“I, well as long as you’re happy and not supressing anything,” John still didn’t seem a hundred percent convinced.

“I’m not. Have you ever known me to suppress any aspect of my personality?”

“No, I suppose not. As long as you’re sure,” said John.

“I’m sure.”

“Going by all the pages you had me read, I gather that’s not all you wanted to tell me. So you’re aromantic as well? You’ve never shown any interest in anyone from what I can tell.”

“No, I’m demi-homoromantic, though given the nature of demi-romanticism and the fact that I only have one experience with romantic interest it is hard to determine if its only men I would be romantically interested in or not, though I strongly suspect it to be the case,” Sherlock rambled.

“Oh, you’ve been in love? With a man?” John asked sounding surprised.

He hadn’t meant to say that! That was more information than he has been expecting to let out.

“No, sorry I shouldn’t ask. But ah demi-romantic, I read about that, it’s when you need to have a strong emotional connection with someone first right? “

“I, yes,” Sherlock imagined he could feel the blood rushing to his cheeks. Was he red faced? It certainly felt like it. Damn transport. “For me it took almost two years after getting to know them, getting used to them in my life,” he explained. He may as well get it all out into the open now, while they were talking. If he stopped now he didn’t know if he’d be able to bring it up again.

“Years, blimey. You sure you weren’t just in denial? I mean I remember the first time I fell in love. It was with a girl in university. It took months before I realised what I was feeling for her. We’d been going out for a while and things were going well but there was that bit extra that I felt for her that I’d never felt for all my previous girlfriends. I never even though it could be love at first. Of course that didn’t last long. A month after I realised that I loved her she broke it off and I was devastated.”

“No, I wasn’t in denial. It took all that time being friends before my feelings changed, before that it was different, simpler,” Sherlock tried to explain. Oh his body was one giant ball of anxiety. How did regular people cope with this? They did this sort of thing all the time–to put yourself on the line, so vulnerable–it felt wretched!

“I didn’t know you had ever been that close to anyone before. You don’t really talk about your past very much,” John pondered.

Well he’d made it this far. Lestrade had advised him to speak up after all, and he was more experienced in these matters than Sherlock was.

“I haven’t,” Sherlock found himself admitting.

“But you just said you’d been friends with this bloke for years,” John said confused.

“I don’t have friends, I only have one,” he said, repeating his words from Baskerville. That seemed like a lifetime ago now.

 For them it had been a simpler time, just the two of them on another case. Even with Sherlock’s miscalculation with the sugar and his slightly misguided experiment with John in the lab. Back then he hadn’t known what to say; he only knew that he had done wrong by John, even if he hadn’t seen it that way at the time, all he’d known was that he hadn’t wanted to lose his only friend. And at the time it had been true, he’d only ever had acquaintances before, even Lestrade hadn’t really counted as a friend then, not as he did now. Meeting John had changed him, changed the way he thought about other people.

He watched John’s face to see if he would connect the dots. This talking about feelings business was hard enough as it was, he didn’t think he could outright express his feelings for John, not right now.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes I really did need to leave it there. If I hadn't it probably would have taken me another week to finish. :P


	25. Wounds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Sherlock and John talk. Well, it's a start anyway.

“What are you—oh—you’re?” John started, his face changed from reflecting his confusion to understanding and shock.

“Yes,” Sherlock shuffled from foot to foot. It was a wonder how one little word could carry so much weight.

“Wow, erm. And you’re sure it’s not just friendship you’re feeling?”

“Very,” Said Sherlock stiffly. He wasn’t sure he expected John to react, he was so new to this, but at least he hadn’t run off.

“Sherlock,” John started slowly, “you know I’m not—”

“I know you’re not sexually attracted to me. That’s obvious. But based on observations and evidence of your character it is highly likely that you could be biromantic, given with a higher leaning towards women than men. But I believe the possibility to be there non the less. Most people would have no idea that sexual and romantic attractions don’t always align. Ever had feelings for a man that you couldn’t explain away as friendship, but since you weren’t sexually attracted to them, you just ignored instead?”

John opened his mouth to say something hen closed it. His brow creased and his mouth turned down.

“You may think on it if you need, I know you like to ah, mull things over or whatever it is you do when you pretend to be busy when you’re really thinking. Go out for a walk, or something,” Sherlock waved his hand towards the door.

“But I—” John started.

“I’ll be perfectly fine for a few hours or however long you need. I won’t leave the flat,” Sherlock promised.

John sighed, “Yeah, yeah okay. I won’t be long,” he said, he pulled his coat off the hook by the door and went to retrieve his wallet and phone. He gave Sherlock one last look before leaving the flat.

Sherlock sat heavily in his armchair. Perhaps he had been a bit too eager in his reveal. He’d thought John had sorted his feelings for Mary; he’d cancelled the wedding after all, but perhaps not. Could that have something to do with his reaction?

Sherlock pressed his hands together under his chin and slipped into his mind palace. It seemed he had some tiding up to do. He needed to organise these meddlesome emotions, he was already missing things. He couldn’t move forward with his mind such a mess.

********

When Sherlock exited his mind palace a few hours later he was happier, with everything once again neatly packaged and ordered. He was also much calmer and also hungry.

The next thing that he noticed was that John wasn’t back yet. It seemed a simple walk to “get some air” hadn’t been enough this time, or he would have been back by now. It was possible he had sought out a friend for some advice. The most likely candidate would be Lestrade, though he was usually too busy to take a proper lunch break so he doubted they had met up in person. Sherlock wasn’t sure how he felt about John even consulting via text with Lestrade. He was one of the only people who he’d confirmed to his feelings for John. Maybe that would be helpful in this situation.

He wondered into the kitchen and looked into the fridge. There he found one of Mrs Hudson’s premade meals, there were a few all in sealed containers with the contents written on top. Not caring what he ended up with he simply reached his hand in and grabbed the first one he came across and popped it in the microwave.

After waiting for a few minutes he was sitting down to a chicken pasta dish. He did quite like Mrs Hudson’s cooking.

He was almost done when he heard the downstairs door slam shut and John’s distinctive gait as he started up the stairs. When he finally entered the flat his face was flushed and hair stuck up in strange (visually pleasing) angles, windswept but with further evidence that he had also run his fingers through it repetitively. He’d been out in the park the whole time. Sherlock had been right in his deduction that John had spoken to Lestrade, also as predicted the detective had been too busy to meet in person.

“I ah, forgot to change the dressing on your wound earlier and I bet you have too. So we’ll get to that now okay?” John said without looking Sherlock directly in the eye.

Ah so he was going for avoidance for now, frustrating but not surprising. On top of everything else it seemed John was having a crisis of orientation. It was in Sherlock’s favour though if he were having doubts. The information he had given John seemed to have made him at least question something about himself otherwise he would have simply told Sherlock that he was definitely not interested.

Oh and it was true that Sherlock had forgotten to change his bandage, though he had intended to do it himself. John had yet to see the scars on his back and he wasn’t sure he wanted him to see them, at least not right now. Questions would be asked, and Sherlock wasn’t sure he was ready for that after showing so much vulnerability to John already.  Besides he tended to prefer to forget about the marks on his body that he’d gained in his two years away. Just thinking about them opened the doors to their associated memories, which he was trying hard to avoid.

He had to roughly shove the memories back again before they could creep too far forward into his conscious mind. They would likely come back when he slept, but there was nothing he could do about that, they tended to pop up without any prompting there anyway.

“It’s fine, I’ll do it now that you’ve reminded me,” he said.

“Sherlock please, It won’t take long and I ah, need to see, make sure you’re healing,” John cleared his throat, still not looking Sherlock in the eye.

So he still felt guilty about Sherlock getting shot by his girlfriend. Sherlock sighed, how could he deny John his peace of mind, especially when he looked like that?

“Alright,” Sherlock said. My, he was in deep with these feelings wasn’t he?

John nodded, “Thanks, you can stay there just remove your shirt, I’ll be back with the med kit,” he said before going into the bathroom to retrieve the kit.

Sherlock resigned himself and started unbuttoning his shirt. It would look strange if he made a fuss and requested to keep it on; he had never cared about John seeing his body when tending wounds in the past.

John walked back into the room as Sherlock was easing his arms out of the sleeves. His chest was still tender and he was glad he tended towards button up shirts; it still hurt too much to lift his arms above shoulder height. He let the shirt fall down the back of his chair and watched as John arranged a chair to face him with the medical kit propped open on the table.

John pulled on a pair of gloves and leaned forward, focused entirely on the bandaged patch on Sherlock’s chest. He began to gently peel back the layers and made a sound of approval when the bullet wound was revealed.

“This looks pretty good actually,” John commented after he set aside the old dressing. He pulled on a new pair of gloves and checked the stitches, which were all intact, and hummed in approval while he started to gently clean the wound. “No sign of infection so it shouldn’t take long to heal. As long as you continue to keep it clean and dry,”

“I’ll be glad when it is,” Sherlock said. This was so much worse than the flesh wounds he was used to. Even now he could cause himself more damage if he strained the wound too much, he knew that first hand.

Finally John finished applying a fresh dressing and was leaning back. “Right, well that’s done,” he gathered up the used gloves and old bandages and moved to dispose of them. “Have you had your antibiotics?” he asked.

“Not yet,” Sherlock answered. He reached back to retrieve his shirt and started to ease his arms back into it.

“Best to have it now if you’ve just had something to eat, I’ll get them for you,” said John. Sherlock heard him open the bin before turning around and he stopped moving. “Sherlock, what’s that on your shoulder?” He asked urgently.

Sherlock had been hoping he’d have his shirt back on by the time John turned around.

“It’s nothing,” he said.

John strode back over to him “That’s not nothing Sherlock,” he placed a hand over Sherlock’s still exposed shoulder. “Is this over your entire back?” he sounded worried.

“It’s fine, all healed by now anyway, nothing more anyone can do,” Sherlock tried to reassure him.

John brushed the shirt back off his shoulders, fingers running lightly over the pink lines on Sherlock’s back. “You’ve been tortured,” his voice shook.

Sherlock swallowed, throat suddenly feeling tight. “Yes, in the time I was away. But that’s all over with and I’m fine.”

“This isn’t fine. These would have been relatively new when you came back, still healing and I,” John sucked in a breath, “I punched you in the face! I—”

“You didn’t know, I didn’t want anyone to know. You didn’t injure me any further.” Sherlock said. He turned his whole body slightly so that he could look at John.

“You went through all that and then I bloody well get you shot because apparently even without you I still attract trouble,” John said.

Sherlock didn’t think he realised that he was still following Sherlock’s scars with his fingers. Sherlock didn’t want him to stop; it was quite the pleasant sensation to feel those rough fingers soothing softly over where he’d been hurt.

“You’ve been tortured and I didn’t even notice the signs, I was too caught up in my anger,” John still sounded distressed.

“It’s fine,” Sherlock said.

“No it’s not fine!” John drew his hands away from Sherlock and turned away from him.

“Perhaps not, but It could be,” Sherlock said, wanting to say more but not knowing how.  

 

 


	26. Slotting into place

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahh I just realised it's been over a month since I last updated. X_X I'm terribly sorry, real life has been quite time consuming lately. I've got a bit of free time at the moment which I  
> I'm hoping is going to be good for writing.  
> :)

John turned to face Sherlock again, “Yeah, yeah okay. It’s just, what you were saying earlier, it’s a lot to take in, in one day. You know I talked to Lestrade and he said I was an idiot for not noticing sooner,” he laughed weakly; “apparently everyone could see it except me.”

“Mycroft figured it out before I did,” Sherlock admitted bitterly. Hadn't that been embarrassing.

“Right, of course he bloody did,” said John with a choked laugh.

“You may think on it more, if that’s what you need,” Sherlock said. He would wait if he had to, even if right now he just wanted to get into Johns head and know just what he was thinking.

“Apart from everything else I don’t think I’m ready for that right now. I’m still dealing with the fallout from Mary.”

“I understand,” Sherlock said. So he’d been right and his reveal had been too soon. He just hoped it hadn’t ruined his chances.

“You don’t, but that’s okay,” John smiled weakly.

********

The next two weeks went by almost as if it were two years ago, and their relationship was as it had been then. It felt as if their conversation had never happened, like his time away had never happened, and Sherlock was left feeling slightly uneasy. Of course this arrangement was much better than it had been previously with Sherlock alone and pinning after John’s company. So that was a huge improvement, it was just that there was a oddness to how they interacted that Sherlock couldn’t quite pin down, like John was being too “John”, or at least too pre faked death John.

Sherlock had also noticed John watching him, which wouldn’t be that unusual except for the frequency and the look on John’s face. Sometimes he looked thoughtful, others he had a small smile on his face. Sherlock had to admit that the reason he noticed so many of these glances were that he found himself looking towards John with increasing frequency. Even during his allotted experiment time (“You can’t sit there all day Sherlock,”) he found he was glancing up every half hour or so to see where John was, to see that he was still there, before looking back down at his work.

He could hear John moving around of course, the squeak of his chair as he shifted his weight, the rustle of paper if he was reading a paper of book, the low murmur of the television. It was reassuring to hear all these sounds as he worked. A subtle reminded that John was here and all was well.

At least everything seemed to be well, until John got the call from Mary.

*******

John had been gone for hours and when he walked back through the door he looked irate and his face was flushed obviously from the exertion it has taken for him to huff up the stairs carrying a large box.  He set the box down by the door with a grunt.

Sherlock looked up from his laptop.

“There’s more downstairs,” was all John said before he disappeared from view again and his thumping footsteps could be heard on the stairs.

Sherlock kept watching the doorway until John returned with another larger box then left for the second time to return with a suitcase. John was officially moving back in; it seemed a decision about Mary had been made, or perhaps made for him. Sherlock’s heart warmed at the thought, over the last few weeks John had been living out of a small duffel bag, with only enough clothes to last him a few days and a few personal items that he’d brought with him after deciding Sherlock needed looking after. Until now most of his life had still been attached to the house he shared with Mary. With the few boxes of John’s belongings it felt like John was at home at 221B again, and that was fantastic.

Sherlock struggled to hide his excitement; he felt it would likely be inappropriate given John’s current mood. He couldn’t help but ask though, “Moving back in then?”

“That’s alright isn’t it?” John asked as he started opening the boxes.

“Of course it is.”

More than alright. Very good in fact.

“After today I can’t even see why I fell in love with her in the first place. She’s not the same,” John said.

“She was likely putting on the persona of Mary, considering that isn’t her real name,” Sherlock tried to reassure him.

“Yes well gullible John Watson falls for it again,” he said, slamming a pile of books down on the coffee table.

“You are not gullible, she was just very well trained, and she fooled me too. Besides, you met in a time of emotional stress; you can’t be blamed for seeing what you wanted to see and not questioning it. She was just what you needed at the time,” Sherlock said.

John had been fooled because he had wanted Mary to be real. She had likely made herself into his ideal partner and had happened to find him at a venerable time. Grudgingly he had to admit that at the time they had met she had probably been good for john; she had helped him get back to normal after Sherlock’s supposed death. Sherlock had likewise missed her deception because he was emotionally compromised and some part of him recognised how good she had been for John and had been blinded to her true self.

John turned to him. “Yeah I guess you’re right,” he let out a deep breath, “Still stings you know.”

“Of course.”

John started putting his books into the book case, fitting them in next to Sherlock’s, just where they had been before. At the sight Sherlock wanted desperately to move up behind John and wrap him up in a hug. He stayed where he was, but watched fondly as John slotted his life back in with Sherlock’s.

John turned around and stopped on his way back to the boxes when he saw the expression on Sherlock’s face.

“Oh,” he started.

“What?” Sherlock was confused.

“Nothing, nothing,” John smiled warmly before moving to continue his unpacking, though now his movements were lighter and Sherlock noticed a distinct lessening in the tension in John’s shoulders as he moved around the flat.

John cleared his throat, “Mary wanted to know how you were getting on with her case. I told her you were hardly in a position to do much after what she did to you. You’re barely out of hospital as it is.”

“I’ve been thinking on it, “ Sherlock admitted, in truth with his movements restricted because of his injury, there was little else to do other than think, and Mary’s problem, despite being something he’s rather not deal with, was at least interesting. “A deal is a deal and the sooner it’s dealt with, the sooner she can be gone from your life. I assume that’s what you want?”

“Yeah, yeah. I just want to put the last few months behind me and move on,” said John.

He came out of the kitchen where he’d been putting away his few mugs and went back over to his remaining box. He set the suitcase on top of the box and hefted them up into his arms. Sherlock watched as he struggled to get them up the stairs, he wanted to offer assistance but knew John would prefer to manage on his own. John seemed to get them to the top without too much trouble and could then be heard putting his clothes away into the wardrobe.

 Just weeks ago this scenario had only been a dream for Sherlock, when all he could do was sit alone in the quiet flat and try and remember what it had been like to hear the sounds of John alive and sharing his space. He took a few moments to just appreciate the sounds of movement from upstairs and how it made the flat feel like home once more.

Personally he too wished the whole business with Mary could be put behind them. As soon as Mary had explained her situation a plan had begun to form in Sherlock’s mind, one where he and John made it into Appledore and were either able to steal back the information on Mary or bargain with Magnussen for it. This plan however was based on the fact that John would want Mary to be a continuing factor in his life and it would put both he and John in a potentially dangerous situation. Now that John was certain he no longer wanted a future with Mary, and in fact could possibly want to share his future with Sherlock, well there was no way Sherlock was putting them both in danger for her. She had betrayed John and almost killed him, no, he would solve her case but they had been through enough already without taking any unnecessary risks.

Either way he was almost certain he would need Mycroft’s help. Which wasn’t actually as horrifying to think about as it would have been a couple of years ago. It was still slightly unnerving to see how much his brother had changed while he’d been gone.  He was still annoying, but perhaps not as insufferable as before. 

It wouldn’t be exactly the result Mary had wanted, but what she’d really wanted was a future as Mrs Mary Watson which wasn't going to happen now. One possibility was that he could give her a grand finale and the opportunity to start over again, for the final time in fact, if everything went according to plan. It had worked for Irene, so why not Mary? Except for her he wouldn’t be there in person for the execution.

 


	27. Plans

He stared at his phone for few moments before he got up from the arm chair and moved towards his room. John watched him go with a frown but didn’t comment. Sherlock never usually cared about privacy with his phone calls, and so it wasn’t surprising that John was curious.

Once he was in his room with the door closed he pressed the answer button on his phone and held it to his ear.

“Hello Mother.”

“Sherlie! For a moment I didn’t think you were going to answer. Why haven’t you called us? It was bad enough that we had to find out about your injury from your brother but now that we’re back in the country it would have been nice to hear from you directly! We were so worried!”

“I’m fine mother; my doctors say I’m recovering nicely. You needn’t worry,” he said.

“Of course I worry, I’m your mother! And it’s YOU after all, we never know what you’re up to, you never tell us anything.”

“I’m a grown man mother, I don’t need to tell you everything,”

“And I don’t expect, nor want to know everything. But when you almost get killed,” she paused to take a deep breath, “Well I’d rather know you’re alright by speaking to you. We hear bits and pieces from Mikey, but it’s just not the same dear.”

“Sorry mother,”

He can hear her sigh, “So you’re taking care of yourself? If you need us to come around to help out we could be there tomorrow.”

“Yes, I’m on house arrest, John’s here monitoring my every movement, it’s horribly tedious. You needn’t come all the way here.”

“Oh that’s wonderful to hear. He’s such a nice man to take care of you like that. We really need to meet John one of these days. In fact that’s perfect. I wanted to check up on you of course, but the other reason I’m calling was to invite you over for Christmas. After everything, we’ve decided to get the family together this year. Your father and I would be delighted to see you, it’s been such a long time since we’ve seen you, especially for Christmas and you should be healed up by then, it can be a double celebration!”

“Mother,” Sherlock began in protest,

“No Sherlock, we almost lost you and it would mean ever so much to us if you could come. You can even bring John, as I said we would love to meet him.   He can bring his fiancé, Mary wasn’t it? The more the merrier. It’s been too long since we’ve had a group round for Christmas,” Sherlock could just imagine her smile on the other side of the line.

“John’s not with Mary anymore, they had a erm – disagreement,” he said.

“Oh dear, well, you definitely have to bring him now. Don’t want him being alone for Christmas.”

********

After Sherlock’s stitches were taken out there were a few days where John would insist he check the skin to make sure it was all holding together, which it was. Eventually he had to concede that Sherlock no longer needed his medical supervision (not that Sherlock really felt he had needed it in the first place), and it left their relationship in an odd situation. They both knew that Sherlock still had another couple of months to completely heal all of his internal injuries, but the risk of infection was extremely low now that the skin has closed up and begun to form scar tissue.  John continued to hover, but now that Sherlock was well and truly on the mend it seemed he was no longer sure of his exact place in the flat.

John had taken his carer duties towards Sherlock extremely seriously but it seemed to have kept their relationship comfortably in a safe carer and patient zone. Their friendship had of course benefited from their cohabitation, but that was where the progression ended. Now that he wasn’t needed as much, he had taken to going out for walks, under the pretence of staying fit.  

From his body language it was obvious that John cared deeply for Sherlock, but it was currently unclear what his intentions were for the future of their relationship. If after all this john decided he wanted to remain best friends, well that wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world, but that would open up the option for him to start dating someone else. That would eventually get them back to where they’d been when Sherlock was helping to plan John and Mary’s wedding, and Sherlock didn’t think he could go through with that a second time.  

This tension between them was slowly driving him mad. So much that he had started to visit Lestrade and Molly at their workplaces. He knew he still wasn’t up to running after criminals but Lestrade had consented to him showing up and observing at low key crime scenes, or looking over cold cases. They were mostly easy to solve and Lestrade and his team would have been able to solve the murders without his help but he desperately needed to get out of the flat for at least a few hours a day. When Lestrade had nothing on, or after he had forcefully kicked Sherlock out of his office for being a distraction he would see Molly, until she too got sick of him hanging about.

********

A few weeks later John got a call from the surgery to ask if he could come in. They were terribly sorry to disturb him, but he had technically run out of his holiday leave and was now using up his sick leave. They were also in the midst of a bad flu season and a few of the other doctors were off genuinely sick and they needed all the help they could get.

Sherlock practically pushed him out the door.

*******

“My mother invited us over for Christmas,” Sherlock blurted out one evening when they were both siting around watching telly.

“What?”

John had been complaining about the fact that he’d had to work with Mary who had refused to quit her job. Their boss had been trying her hardest to roster them on different shifts, different days but sometimes an overlap was unavoidable. She was still being cold to him, still pestering him about them getting Magnussen off her back.

Sherlock had just been thinking of something he could say to cheer John up when that had blurted out of him mouth.

“Christmas, at my parents, they’ve invited us,” he said, unsure what had been confusing about his first statement.  John was still looking at him oddly. “What?”

“Your parents,” started John

“What about them?”

“They’re alive,”

“Why wouldn’t they be?”

“Well I don’t know, you never talk about them. You never visit them or even call them. I just assumed they were dead.”

“You’ve never asked,” Sherlock shrugged, “They spend a lot of time traveling around, and you know I prefer to text.”

“Right – so Christmas then?” John said slowly.

“What about It? My mother insisted I come home for Christmas and extended the invitation to you. You don’t have to come of course.”

“No, actually that sounds like a great idea. I think it will be nice to get out of the city for a while, meet your parents,” he smiled widely “yeah that sounds like a great idea. Could be interesting, the parents of Sherlock and Mycroft Holmes.”

“You’ll be disappointed, they’re both boringly normal.”

“I’m sure that’s not true, besides I don’t care, they’re your parents and I’d be honoured to meet them. No matter if you think their boring or not.”

“We’ll have to put up with Mycroft, and she’ll expect us to all stay the night,” Sherlock warned. Though he wasn’t sure why he was trying to give John excuses to back out. He’d already said yes after all and he found he was really hoping that he’d get to spend Christmas with John, despite his disdain for the holiday in general.

“Mycroft’s been almost friendly lately, so I honestly have no problem spending Christmas with him Besides I ah,” John cleared his throat before continuing, “I’d rather not spend another Christmas without you, so wherever you decide to go I’ll be there with you,”

Sherlock could help the smile that came over his face.

******

Christmas was the kind of holiday Sherlock usually tried to ignore. Before he’d met John he’d been mostly unaware of it (or tried to be). His brother didn’t bother with it either, unless their parents were involved and Sherlock tended to avoid large crowds and shopping centres so happily avoided the hysteria the rest of the population seemed to get caught up in every year. In Sherlock’s point of view it was a pointless materialistic holiday where there were so many social rules around gift giving that it pointless to even try and get it right.

The last one he had celebrated had been at Baker Street the year before Moriarty had returned, and that had only been because of John and Mrs Hudson who had insisted on hosting a party in their flat. He must admit that it hadn’t been completely horrible. For once he had actually liked most of the people attending and John had let him off from gift giving as long as he promised to play his violin.

Sherlock hoped having John there this year would help keep the whole experience tolerable, he certainly wasn’t looking forward to his mother’s fussing. It was true that he hadn’t seen them in person for many years and he wasn’t quite sure what to expect.

The morning of the 25th of December dawned and Sherlock woke with a sense of dread in his stomach. He lay in bed and listened to John who was already banging about in the kitchen while humming one of those Christmas songs he’d insisted on playing for the past few days. Sherlock had refused to hear them any sooner than a week out from the actual day, which had been a compromise on both their parts.

It suddenly occurred to him that John was going to be meting his parents for the first time, at Christmas. John, the man he was in love with. He wasn’t sure why it had only occurred to him now, but he was sure that was a big deal for most normal people. Wasn’t it? What did John think about the invitation? He certainly seemed excited, too excited in Sherlock’s opinion.  What would his parents think of John? Well most people seemed to like John well enough, he looked calm and unassuming, especially when he insisted on wearing those absurd knitted jumpers he liked so much.  

There was a light knock on his bedroom door. “Sherlock you up?”

“Mmm , yes I’ll be out in a moment,” Sherlock called back.

“Good, we’ll need to get an early start if we want to get there on time,”

Sherlock forced himself out of bed and walked through to the bathroom.  Today was going to be a long one.


	28. Mr and Mrs Holmes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! I know, I know, its been such a long time. Hopefully there's still some of you hanging around waiting to read this. I'm on break from class again so here's hoping my muse sticks around a bit longer this time.

**_Last time..._ **

_It suddenly occurred to him that John was going to be meting his parents for the first time, at Christmas. John, the man he was in love with. He wasn’t sure why it had only occurred to him now, but he was sure that was a big deal for most normal people. Wasn’t it? What did John think about the invitation? He certainly seemed excited, too excited in Sherlock’s opinion.  What would his parents think of John? Well most people seemed to like John well enough, he looked calm and unassuming, especially when he insisted on wearing those absurd knitted jumpers he liked so much._

_There was a light knock on his bedroom door. “Sherlock you up?”_

_“Mmm , yes I’ll be out in a moment,” Sherlock called back._

_“Good, we’ll need to get an early start if we want to get there on time,”_

_Sherlock forced himself out of bed and walked through to the bathroom.  Today was going to be a long one._

********

**Now**

As planned they caught the train out of the city before picking up a hire car organised by Mycroft for the rest of the journey.

Sherlock drove and tried to keep most of his concentration on the road. His stomach was feeling uncomfortably like it was defying physics and twisting itself into knots. He knew logically that this feeling was likely a symptom of anxiety. But if he thought about it too much he would have to confront the reason why he was feeling anxious.

His parents were utterly boring and normal; there shouldn’t be anything to be anxious about. They weren’t even that observant, his mother would be so focused on finally having her children home for Christmas and making sure the food was perfect. Surely she wouldn’t notice anything of Sherlock’s feelings. His father had never been too observant, too caught up in his own head; Sherlock was perfectly certain he wouldn’t notice anything unless it was pointed out to him. But then he had to wonder what Mycroft had told them. His brother was at his worst when he thought he was doing the right thing. His mother had known about John of course, he had mentioned him in conversation and Sherlock knew it was highly improbably that his parents, even so far out of city life that they were, would have seen him and John in the news from one of their more high profile cases.

“I can’t believe I actually get to meet your parents,” John said from the passenger seat.

“So you’ve said,” Sherlock took a quick glance at John. He still looked as bemused as he had when Sherlock had first told him about their Christmas plans. He was entirely too excited for what Sherlock was expecting to be a rather dull two days.

 “Right,” said John, “still, the parents of Sherlock and Mycroft Holmes, they’ve got to be interesting, so yeah I’m looking forward to meeting them.”

Sherlock snorted. “I assure you that they are maddeningly ordinary.”

“Oh yeah?”

“My mother is a retired mathematician and my father spends most of his time in the garden,” Sherlock explained.

“Being a mathematician isn’t ordinary,” John argued.

“Retired,” Sherlock argued back.

“That doesn’t matter. And anyway, that’s not the point. I don’t want to meet them because they could be interesting. I want to meet them because they’re your family.”

Sherlock didn’t reply after that and they continued their journey in silence except for John’s occasional commentary on the scenery.   

********

They pulled into the drive of Sherlock’s parent’s country home early that afternoon and, just as Sherlock had intended, just in time for lunch. He knew his mother would have something prepared, even if she hadn’t specifically asked them to be there for it.

The doors to the house opened just as they were getting the suitcases out of the boot. And there they all were his mother, father and brother all exiting the door. Followed by—

“Lestrade?” Sherlock froze with his hand on the car boot that he’d been about to slam shut.

“Hey Sherlock, John. Surprise!” he laughed, though he looked slightly sheepish. Though Sherlock didn’t have more time to contemplate the fact that he had actually missed something, when he was pulled into a hug.

“Sherlock! And all in one piece too,” said his mother as she patted his back and pecked him on the cheek before pulling back. She looked smug at having caught him unawares.

“It’s great to see you darling. And looking so well. We were so worried about you after you were shot —It was just terrible! I knew you were okay, but to see you now — ” She pulled him into another hug and this time Sherlock tentatively wrapped his arms around her and pat her back in what he hoped was a reassuring gesture.

“I’m fine. Hard not to be with John’s constant hovering,” he complained. Though he didn’t really mean it.

“Oh yes John!” she pulled back once more “well are you going to introduce us?”

He realised that his father had come to stand beside him mother while Lestrade and Mycroft hung back on the porch.  He was smiling at his son warmly and gave a small nod when Sherlock met his eye, but didn’t seem to want to interrupt.

“Uh yes, Mother, Father, this is John Watson. John, my parents,” Sherlock said.

John had a large smile on his face when he stepped forward to shake their hands.

“It’s great to meet you,”

“Likewise, especially since you’re the first friend of Shelock’s that he’s brought home,” said his mother.

“Mother!” Sherlock objected

“I, ah,” John started, blush blooming across his cheeks.

“Both our son’s bringing someone to Christmas dinner, well I never though’t I’d see the day, but I did hope,” she said.

“Mother!” both brothers protested at the same time.

“Now boys, let your mother enjoy herself, it’s been a stressful few years,” their father said.

The brothers didn’t say anything but both nodded.

“Well let’s all get settled inside,” Sherlock’s mother said before turning away, "I'll lead you boys up to your room."

John reached past Sherlock to close the boot of the car, startling the detective.

“Here,” John handed Sherlock his suitcase before grabbing his own and heading for the house. Sherlock quickly followed.

The house only had four bedrooms and Mycroft and Lestrade had already taken one each.

“I’m sorry boys, but you’ll have to share. I hope you don’t mind, but I made sure you got the biggest room. We just have more people than usual this year,” Mrs Holmes explained.

“I can sleep on the couch downstairs if you like,” offered John.

“Nonsense, that old thing will be incredibly uncomfortable. Sherlock will share with you, won’t you Sherlock?” His mother said as she led them upstairs.

She opened the door to the room which held one large queen sized bed. There would certainly be enough space for the two of them. Why did the thought make his heart beat faster? He couldn’t be nervous about sharing a room with john, surely. They had already lived together in a relatively small flat for years. Sherlock had even fallen asleep on the lounge with John in the room.

“Uh yes, yes it won’t be a problem; you know it’s bad for your shoulder when you don’t sleep on a proper bed John,” Sherlock said.

John eyed the size of the bed and nodded in agreement. “That’s true, and it looks like there will be plenty of space,” He turned to smile at Mrs Holmes.  “This will do fine, thanks,”

“I’m glad. Well, I’ll let you two get settled. I’m going to go put the kettle on. Come and find us in the sitting room when you’re done,” She smiled warmly at the two of them before she left.

*******

After dinner and last drinks John had announced he was going up to bed. For some reason Sherlock couldn’t bring himself to join him just yet and so was seated in the sitting room looking out the window at the stars. There were so many more visible out here in the country without the mass of light pollution that was London.

John and been received extremely well by his parents. But that was no surprise really; most people responded kindly to John on first meeting, he was just that sort of person. It was something Sherlock could only pull off with a lot of observation and acting, and only when he could be bothered.

Although with John, sometimes the effect seemed to wear off slightly as the person got to know him, as evidence by john’s long list of ex-girlfriends. Though that was something that Sherlock couldn’t understand. When you got to know him, John was particularly fascinating, and not just the generically likeable man he often seemed on first impression. 

Regardless, the conversation had run smoothly all afternoon though lunch and through dinner. Sherlock hadn't even needed to engage too much, which he preferred. He would answer questions when asked and would give his opinion when needed but overall he was happy to leave most of the talking to the rest of the group. Apparently most of Scotland Yard were now fans of The Blog and apparently so was his father. John, Lestrade and his parents had engaged in quite the lively conversation to Sherlock’s horror, with Mycroft injecting the occasional witty remark. The Blog was a romanticised version of events with little emphasis on fact. If all of Scotland Yard had been reading it—

John had even entered into a conversation with his father about gardening. Perhaps he’d been wrong about the pot plants out the front of Mary and John’s shared house. He had been gone for a significant amount of time, were there things about John that had changed? Would he want a garden?

Sherlock heard the noise of someone walking into the room followed by a rustle of fabric and the groan of the old arm chair as someone sat down next to him.

“Mother? I thought you were going up to bed?”  he asked, before turning away from the window to look at her. She was wearing a fluffy dressing gown over her night clothes.

“I was but I saw you were still up and thought I’d stop by before I do,” she said.

She was looking at him strangely, the same way she’d been watching him all night. “What is it? You’ve been observing me all night.” It had been bothering him all evening. The look had been part surprised, part fond, and part knowing, as far as he could deduce but he had yet to put together the meaning behind that odd combination of emotions.

She smiled softly at him. “I just never thought I’d see the day. We had all thought you just weren’t that way inclined, which would have been perfectly alright, as long as you were happy of course.”

“Mother, what are you talking about?”

“My Sherlock in love. I can see it when you look at him darling, and I’m happy for you,” she said.

Sherlock could feel his face heating. Damn it, how he wished he could control that response. He swears he’s blushed more in the last few weeks than he has in his entire life up until this point.  

“No need to be embarrassed dear, he’s a good man your John,” her eyes were glistening in the dim light of the lamp beside them. Suddenly she was pulling him towards her into a hug, his arms remaining trapped by his sides. She squeezed tight before she pulled back and kissed him on the cheek. As she leant back into her seat again she laughed when she saw the disgruntled expression on his face 

His face was certainly warm now and he couldn’t help but think about the term ‘your John,’ as of it could actually be true. Could he be John’s Sherlock too? He thought he would like that very much.

“Right, I really should be getting up to bed before your father sends out a search party,” she stood and headed towards the stairs.

“Don’t wait too long to go up yourself,” she paused to look back at him, “You’ll work it out darling,” then she turned away to continue up to bed.

Sherlock turned back to look out the window as the thought of John, all warm under the covers of that large bed, probably reading of those (not very mysterious) mystery novels he loved, waiting for Sherlock to come up to bed.  It sent a warm feeling through his chest to mingle with his nerves. It was completely irrational, but then again human emotion was extremely irrational at the best of times.

He looked out at the stars for another ten minutes before heading upstairs.


	29. Fluff

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy New Year everyone! even though its a few weeks late. This chapter took way too long to get together, but here it is! Thanks to anyone still following this story.

Sherlock paused at the door to the bedroom, his mother’s words swirling around inside his head before he grasped the handle and turned. He almost thought he was still imagining with the sight that the opened door presented him. Too good to be true? John was there with his book and his warmth, that half smile on his lips and fond look in his eyes.

“I was beginning to wonder if you would be staying down there all night,” John said.

“No, no, I was just talking to my mother,” he didn’t mention the time he spent simply gazing outside. “I’ll um, just get changed,” he continued. Why was talking to John suddenly so hard? Usually he didn’t think twice before just saying what was on his mind, or not speaking at all if he didn’t need to say anything.

He quickly swooped over to his bag and found his night clothes before escaping to the bathroom. Sherlock was appalled at himself. Perhaps it was true what people said about love turning people into fools? John knew him, John actually liked him, was used to him and how he thought, even if he didn’t always understand. John was the one that caught him when he stumbled though social situations he usually couldn’t care for.

He got ready for bed quickly before loitering in the bathroom for a couple of extra minutes. He frowned at his reflection in the mirror. Normal people stumbled their way through these relationship things all the time. It couldn’t be that had. Though given this wasn’t the usual situation, there wasn’t any physical attraction between them like the majority of other couples.  But surely it couldn’t be THAT different?  Either way it was only one night sharing a bed. Not a marriage proposal. Did he want a marriage proposal? No this was not the time to be pondering that. He was getting away from the issue. One night sharing a bed with John. That was it.

With new resolve Sherlock walked back to the bedroom. He found John had put his book down on the night stand and turned off the main light in favour of the bedside lamp. He was lying with his head propped up on his shoulder and was taking up the side of the bed near close to the window, so he was across the bed from Sherlock. He watched silently as Sherlock put his clothes away before lifting up the covers on the bed and sliding in.

He lay in his back for a few moments, not sure what to do. When he’d shared a bed with Janine he’d been following her lead, and acting on what he’d seen in clips from romantic movies that he’d found as part of his research on relationships. Eventually he turned over onto his side so that he was mimicking John’s pose.

They simply gazed at each other for a few moments, and despite the speed at which his heart was beating it was a comfortable silence. This was nice just lying here next to John, despite the fact that he had no idea what to do next. His physical presence was right there, front and centre of his perception. From the warm puffs of air that Sherlock could both hear and feel ever time John let out a breath, to the overwhelming presence of his body and the warmth he radiated. Sherlock could feel him there without even touching him. He was close enough to smell John too, the mixture of clean soap and laundry detergent over the natural human smell of sweat and natural oils that was uniquely John. It was almost too much to have the majority of his senses filled with the different aspects of John. All the little pieces that made him up were right here dominating Sherlock’s physical space as well as his mental space. He had to close his eyes and take a deep breath.

“Sherlock?” John questioned, his voice abounding so much louder than usual in the quiet room. He sounded worried. John shouldn’t be worried.

“It’s just a little overwhelming, so much stimuli all at once,” he explained.

“Oh do you need me to leave? I’m sure I could fit on the couch downstairs,” John couldn’t quite hide the disappointment in his voice. The covers rustled and it sounded as though he were getting ready to get up.

“No!” Sherlock exclaimed rather louder than he had intended. He took another deep breath and opened his eyes. “No,” he said again, this time much quieter, “I mean, I want you to stay, it’s just all so new. Having you so close, but it’s pleasant. Very good in fact,” Sherlock explained.

“Okay, as long as you’re sure.”

“Very.”

“I realised you mean much more to me than I ever thought possible. It’s so different from what I’ve felt for anyone else before, so it’s new for me too. I knew you were my best friend but that wasn’t all it was and after you explained romantic vs sexual attraction well, it made a lot more sense. So I do want to try and make whatever is between us work,” John admitted.

Gazing into John’s eyes all Sherlock could see was honesty and affection. Affecting aimed at him. It was what he’d wanted without knowing for such a long time. He didn’t know how to respond.

“That’s what you want isn’t it?” John asked after a few moments of silence.

“Yes, yes very much so,” Sherlock said, and wondered what John was seeing in his face.

“Good, good. Well I’m knackered. I, well I hope we can talk some more about this later? But for now I need to sleep, “

“Yes of course. Goodnight John,”

“Goodnight Sherlock.”

********

Sherlock woke feeling pleasantly warm and comfortable. He had already shuffled closer to the source of the warmth before he realised it was a human body. He stilled, John, he was currently pressed up against a warm and solidly sleeping John, whose face was pressed up against his shoulder. He must have shuffled down the bed in his sleep. Sherlock’s body was now turned toward John, his face close to the top of his head. One of John’s arms was pressed against Sherlock’s side and his hand was resting on his chest. Sherlock could feel the heat from each finger though the fabric of his sleep shirt, the skin underneath tingling pleasantly.  He didn’t want to move, this was amazingly good. The affection he felt for John seemed to swell in his chest, as absurd as that actually sounded, he didn’t even care right now. This was definitely what he wanted, this right here, whatever this feeling was, and it felt fantastic. With nothing else to be concerned with he could imagine that his entire would was the two of them right here right now, pressed together simply being, warm and comfortable.

Sherlock cracked his eyes open to confirm that yes, it was still early. The light was barely beginning to creep though the gaps in the curtains. Sherlock never usually sleep so many hours in a row, having gone to bed at a reasonable time the night before, he was surprised he hadn’t woken hours earlier, though perhaps this could become a habit if it felt this good to sleep next to John.  

He felt the strong desire to run his fingers though John’s hair, to feel the texture against his fingers and a curiosity to see if he could tell the difference between the grey and blonde hairs based on touch alone. It took a few moments of hesitation before he decided to go ahead with his experiment.

His hand reached up to brush though John’s sleep mused hair. He brushed it once to lie flat, and then back up again. It was softer than he’d imagined, and a little oily close to the scalp, but that didn’t deter from how pleasant it felt as the strands slid against his fingers. There were also a few hairs that stood out as being slightly courser than the rest; these would be the grey hairs. Sherlock hummed, pleased with this discovery.

John shuffled closer in his sleep, and Sherlock stilled until John had settled once again.

His questing fingers began to map out the shape of John’s skull. Sherlock has always wanted to, he could of course learn a lot about John’s skeletal structure just from looking at him and his movements, but it was nothing compared to actually feeling the bones there under his hands, feeling the joints move. The human body was a complex and fascinating mechanism, and to know the intimate details of John’s basic structure, well, he found it extremely appealing.

It seemed there was a slight dip in the back of John’s skull that he had previously been unaware of, obviously covered up by his hair.

“Humm,” John mumbled, causing Sherlock to freeze once again.

“Dun stp, fels gud,” John mumbled against Sherlock’s shoulder, his speech muffled and slightly slurred.

Sherlock tentatively began moving his fingers against John’s scalp again.

“Hummm,” John mumbled again and Sherlock finally opened his eyes to see John had a soft smile on his face.

He couldn’t stop the rush of warmth and affection he felt for John in that moment. It seemed impossible that he could feel more and deeper than he had been minuted before, but apparently he could.

“Morning John,” Sherlock said, smiling down at the other man.

John opened his eyes and pulled back a bit so he could get a better view of Sherlock’s face.

“Morning,” he smiled.

John’s eyes drooped again as Sherlock continued his head massage. Sherlock found interest in simply observing John’s reactions and figuring out what movements John liked best.

They stayed in a comfortable silence for a few moments until John leaned away, yawning. Sherlock let his hand fall down to John’s shoulder to rest.

“Well that was a nice way to wake up,” he commented, before propping himself up on one elbow. He looked on Sherlock with curiosity.

Sherlock rose himself up to match so their faces were level with each other. “I didn’t mean to wake you,” he admitted.

“Got a bit carried away did you?” John joked, but he smiled when he said it.

“I find every aspect about you fascinating; I was exploring the texture of your hair and shape of your skull,” Sherlock admitted.

John laughed “Of course you were,” he laughed some more, “well I enjoyed it, I hadn’t realised how nice it was to have my head massaged till now.”

“The scalp is quite sensitive and the stimulation on certain nerves can produce a pleasure sensation,”

“Yeah, yeah I know,” John said, though he still sounded amused. He smiled at Sherlock and lifted his fee hand to run it though Sherlock’s hair.

Sherlock closed his eyes and concentrated on the feeling.

“You like that too?” John asked.

“Mmm, yes,”

“That’s good to know,” John said. He continued for a few moments before pulling away again, and Sherlock opened his eyes.

“I guess we’ll have to figure out what each other likes and doesn’t, but then so do other couples,” John pondered. “You like being touched, just not sexually?”

“Yes, I’m also not overly fond of kissing,” he remembered with distaste having to pretend to enjoy kissing with Janine.

“What about this?” John leaned forward to brush his lips against Sherlock’s cheek, then again on his forehead.

“That would be, acceptable,” said Sherlock after a short pause. He was slightly thrown by the romantic gesture and that he actually liked it.

“Right, that’s good, and this, sleeping in the same bed, you’d like to do that again too?”

“Yes, If it’s acceptable to you. There may be some times when I may wish to not sleep, or to sleep alone, most likely during a case, but,” he paused “you could movie into my room at Baker St, it is of course the bigger room and closer to the kitchen, but I’d understand if you wanted to keep your own space upstairs.”

John stopped him with a finger to his lips.

“Yeah, I think that’s a great Idea.”

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
